Standing in the Way of Control
by going by me
Summary: Memories are brought to the surface when Meredith is forced to deal with Ellis's death. Set after the ferry arc in season 3. A MerDer story.
1. Hiding My Heart

_A/N - So, this is the first chapter of my first story. It's pretty long, I hope you don't mind. Next chapter will probably be shorter... Anyway, I noticed it took quite a long time to write this and it certainly took forever to edit it. So after having read it so many times that I now am going crazy over it, I just want to get it out, so I am too lazy to let someone beta it. Since English is not my first language, should you find mistakes in grammar or use of words or anything, please PM me. This story takes place after the ferry arc in season 3, since I wanted Meredith to deal with Ellis's death. It's pretty much a MerDer story, where they make some kind of progress in their relationship already at this point. I hope you'll enjoy it._

-----

Meredith was dragged from her much needed sleep as the alarm went off. She blinked sleepily at the radio. 5.20. How could it be that she always was short of sleep? It seriously shouldn't be that hard to go to bed in a reasonable time. She turned to shut the alarm with her right hand and while shifting positions, her body touched something - someone - warm and bare. She smiled a little. Of course. With Derek next to her, it sometimes was a little hard to actually sleep. For some reason, it seemed that they always had better things to do those precious hours between getting off work and getting back to work again. Derek was lying on his stomach, his arms hanging outside the bed and the sheet barely covering his back. He hadn't stirred from the shrill alarm. Meredith let her hand run through his hair and down his back a couple of times before he muttered something and turned to her.

"Good morning," she mumbled into his ear. He grinned at her, but soon he turned serious and looked at her, as if he was afraid of something. Meredith pretended not to notice and smiled again. "Did you sleep well?" Derek blinked. Just as she had done, he glanced at the radio and grunted. "I know it's 5.23," continued Meredith softly, "but..." She let her finger linger at his lips, tracing their curve. Derek changed positions so that he faced her, dragging her closer, embracing her. Meredith smiled inwardly and shifted so that she lay curled with her back against his chest. For a while they just lay in this accustomed position, Meredith enjoying the feeling of Derek breathing her in. "I haven't showered," she giggled at last. "I think you just sucked the last lavender out." Derek's grip around her tightened, his breath heavy, but he didn't move. "Derek?", Meredith said at last, used to him answering her playfully or teasing her or saying all those perfect things that seemed to come so naturally for him. "Derek, what's wrong?", she tried when he didn't answer. He stroked her hair, then finally turned to look at her, his eyes deep blue wells.

"It's just... " He shook his head and started over. "How bad is it today?" Meredith sighed.

"I'm fine. You're hovering."

"Your mom died, Meredith." Derek looked resolutely at her, as if that was something that inexorably must lead to a given set of feelings, and a given way of dealing with them. The thing was, Meredith knew it didn't. Not for her.

"And I already had her cremated," she stated. "It's closure. I've moved on." Or at least she tried to. Talking about it or thinking about it just made it harder. Derek just made it harder. Couldn't he see that?

"Tell me about her." Derek's voice was calm but firm. He wouldn't let her slip away. He wouldn't let her move on, wouldn't let her avoid that dark place where the memories of her mother lodged. He didn't flinch even as she tried her most stern look. "Tell me about your mom. How was she?" She sighed. Her silence apparently wouldn't keep him from asking. She tried to think of something that would characterize her mother without leading them to dangerous territory.

"She was... busy. Working." She hoped that would be enough, but Derek just kept his gaze at her, waiting. He didn't give in; didn't settle for her answers. Obviously didn't care about her resistance to the subject. "Look, she's dead. And I need to shower." She didn't have the strength to dig deeper in her memory after yet a neutral word to satisfy him. He gave her a look.

"Okay, so tell me how bad it is today." That look. She had almost gotten used to it now. It was a look he would never have given her Before. It was almost as if he had replaced all those looks she had gotten used to, that she had come to wait for and never stopped thinking about, with this one. It was as if he didn't know how to look at her anymore.

"I'm fine," she repeated quickly, needing the look to vanish, to be replaced with his smile. Needing him to agree.

"You died, Meredith." _You died. You died_. The words hang between them. Meredith could tell that this was something Derek had dwelt on. She wasn't sure though, whether or not there was guilt in his statement. She pushed the feeling aside and tried to make him understand.

"And then I lived. I got a second chance. I'm embracing it." Derek nodded slowly. He didn't smile. He didn't seem to get what she was trying to tell him. He didn't seem to stop worrying, when it was the only thing she wanted him to do. Meredith felt her attempt at brightness fall to the ground, but instead of letting it lead to an argument, she shrugged and shook of her sheets. "I'm taking that shower now," she announced. "You should get up. Izzie's probably made breakfast. It's what she does when _she's _hovering." She caught sight of Derek smiling bleakly before she left the room.

When she came down the stairs after having spent a quarter of an hour in the bathroom, trying hard not to think about Derek, she smelled fresh bread. _Izzie. _But when she approached the kitchen, she heard frantic footsteps behind her and felt a steady grip around her arm.

"I slept over," Izzie gasped. "I forgot to set the freaking alarm. Of course, it didn't help to have Alex in the next room." She rolled her eyes. "I don't think it is such a good idea for us to live together." She shook her head, not yet dressed and her blond hair disheveled. "Anyway, I slept too long and now I'm gonna be late and... what's that smell?" Meredith followed her into the kitchen only to find Derek sitting at the table, a basket of bagels and croissants standing on top of it together with fresh orange juice already poured in two glasses. The coffee pot on the bench was steaming, making the whole kitchen both smell and look like something from a commercial. She stopped in her tracks, not knowing what to say. It never looked like this in her kitchen. Except for those times Izzie decided to transform it to a cookie battlefield, it never looked like anything, really.

"Nobody was up," Derek said happily. "And I'm not a baker like Izzie" - he smiled at her where she was standing in the doorway, looking incredulous - "so I went down to the baker on the next street." Meredith felt confused. Gone was the serious, concerned Derek from this morning in bed, the one she had avoided to think about standing under water so hot she almost couldn't feel anything.

"I thought you liked muesli," she said at last, not really meaning it to come out that harsh. Izzie looked at her as if she was going crazy, but Derek only grinned at her. Playing the good host, he motioned for them both to go ahead and help themselves. Izzie looked down at her pink robe, only loosely tied around her waist and put her hair up haphazardly with an elastic.

"I'm gonna go change. If I eat in the car, would you guys give me a ride to work?" She snatched a croissant from the table, turned and headed for the stairs.

"Sure," Meredith nodded. "I'll save you some." With Izzie gone, she sat down next to Derek, looking suspiciously at him. "Why are you doing this?" She made a sweeping gesture over the table. He quirked an eyebrow.

"I've heard food's good for you." Before she could began stuttering her usual harangue about how she didn't need anything from him and how fine she was, he got serious. "I figured you would need a good breakfast before going back to work. Unless you don't want to stay home a couple of days. There is no shame in needing a little time off after what happened, Meredith." Meredith rolled her eyes, feeling her annoyance from before increase and already regretting questioning his suddenly light mood. They had already gone over this, and she had already told him what little good it would do her to wander around in the house all by herself. She would go crazy. Staying home was not an option. "Fine," Derek said when she didn't reply. He didn't insist, having known her answer. Instead he looked at her. "I get that it's not a great time at 5.30 in the morning. But eventually we will talk about this. We need it. I need it." He hesitated, but didn't say anything more. Meredith glanced at him, helping herself to a bagel. Trying hard to maintain the good spirit she had woken up with and knowing there would be no point in discussing this matter with him for the moment, she didn't bother to answer him. They ate in silence for a while, Derek absent-mindedly browsing through a newspaper Meredith assumed he'd got on his way to the baker's, seeing as she didn't take any paper. Looking into the hall to see if Izzie was anywhere near ready to go, she happened to catch sight of the time. She jumped up.

"We need to hurry," she urged. "Bailey's gonna kill us if we're late."

"What are you fussing for?. Right now, you could get away with anything." Alex strolled into the kitchen, lifting a bagel and examining it. He just shrugged when Meredith demanded to know what exactly he meant by that. "You know, with the dead mommy and the almost drowning thing. I'm just saying. You could probably walk in an hour late and she'd still not yell." Meredith glared at him and left the kitchen without saying another word. Alex looked after her and poured some coffee into his mug. "Maybe we should bring Bailey a bagel. Might avoid us getting stuck in the pit all day." His comment wasn't directed at anyone in particular, but Derek grinned at him as he stood up.

"Just as long as you tell her it's all on me."

After a speeded car ride, preceded by some intense last minute preparation, Izzie, Alex and Meredith rushed through the hospital lobby, leaving Derek behind as they hurried over to the interns' locker room. Cristina and George were standing by their lockers, George fumbling with his ID and Cristina looking bored. She opened her mouth to say something, but quieted as Bailey entered the changing room. She didn't even bother to look at Alex and Izzie when she sourishly commented on them being late. Meredith looked up, not believing that Alex could have a point in what he had said earlier.

"What about me?" She pulled her scrubs over her head, struggling to get ready before the others could leave without her. Bailey looked at her.

"Your mom died and you almost joined her. I think that gives room for a little late."

"I'm fine," Meredith began, but was cut off as Bailey started assigning them. "What about me?" she repeated as she saw the other interns getting their tasks and disappearing, casting her apologetic glances. She swore inwardly when Bailey told her to go down to the pit and find something to do and rummaged through her locker for her coat. "Once again, I'm fine. And I'd rather be doing something useful." She closed her locker forcefully, but Bailey didn't seem convinced.

"You can tell everybody you're fine 'til you're blue in your face. You're taking it easy. And pit is useful. Go." She looked sternly at her. Meredith sighed, but didn't protest any further and headed down to the pit.

-----

At ten o'clock, she had seen three patients, all with minor injuries that didn't require any effort from her side. She sneaked down an empty corridor to get a short break and to grab herself a Styrofoam coffee. She hadn't seen anyone she knew all morning. Derek and Cristina were probably in surgery. Cristina would probably even learn something today. She sipped on the bitter coffee while slowly walking back to the E.R. A slender nurse standing at the desk with an open chart caught sight of her.

"Bed 8. Patient came in with the ambulance five minutes ago, presenting with tender arm and shoulder and dizziness from falling in the schoolyard." Meredith nodded and headed towards the bed. The dark-haired girl lying there tried to sit up when Meredith entered, but fell down against the pillows. Meredith smiled reassuringly and cast a quick glance at the chart.

"Just relax, Julie. I'm Dr. Grey and I'm gonna take care of you." Even with her sore shoulder, the girl made an attempt to shrug and told Meredith that she thought she really was fine. "I promise I'll be quick and if you're right, you'll be out of here soon." Meredith put the chart on the bedside table, starting her preliminary exam of Julie's arm. Julie nodded cautiously and shifted on Meredith's command to let her get a better view. She chewed her lip for a little while before she hesitantly spoke.

"I was at the playground in school. It was stupid, really. Only kids are there." She looked up. "I'm twelve." Meredith nodded and went on to examining Julie's shoulder. "But I needed to be alone. The younger kids were at the swings, so I went to the climbing frame. But somehow, I slipped and fell." She winced as Meredith's fingers ran over her collarbone and grimaced apologetically. "It wasn't even slippery, from rain or whatever. I guess I was just clumsy as always." Meredith studied her inquiringly, but let the comment pass.

"And now you feel dizzy and your arm hurts," she concluded. "Did you feel dizzy before you fell?" Julie shook her head and opened her mouth as if to say something, but broke off and quieted immediately. "Julie?" prompted Meredith. "If you didn't feel well before you fell, there might be something that caused your fall. It would be good for us to know when we try to treat you." Even though Julie kept claiming that she had been fine, she looked down and squirmed a little while she was talking. Once again, Meredith studied her with concern. It was something about the girl's behaviour that made her uneasy. But Julie avoided her glance and she decided not to press her. "Okay, Julie, here's what we're gonna do. I think your collarbone might be broken, so we're gonna go see Dr. Torres who is in ortho. Also, your dizziness needs to be explained, so I'll take you down for a CT as well, which will tell us more about it." She started wheeling the bed as she talked.

"A CT is an x-ray, right?" Julie plucked with her sheets.

"That's right. It will gives us a clear picture of your brain and what may cause the dizziness. It's not uncomfortable unless you're claustrophobic," Meredith replied, smiling down at the girl. "Do you want us to call someone? Your parents?" Julie bit her lip.

"It's just my mom. And, um... she's at work, so I'll better not bother her."

"I'm sure she would make it here if she hears you're hurt," said Meredith gently, immediately wanting to bit her own lip for assuming something she didn't know anything about. Julie sat up a bit straighter.

"She's busy," she stated defensively. "Just don't call her." Meredith nodded slowly. She didn't need the child to be upset or not to trust her when she was about to undergo procedures, so she didn't argue further. Instead she smiled at Julie and assured her that it wasn't necessary to call her mother right now. Julie nodded, seeming relieved. "But you'll come with me, right, Dr. Grey?" she asked. She tried to sound unconcerned, but Meredith heard the pleading in her request and let her smile grow warmly.

"Here it is, Julie," she said, spotting Callie in the exam room they had stopped outside. "And I'm not going anywhere."

Callie agreed with Meredith's initial diagnosis after having examined Julie and gave her a collar-n-cuff to prevent pain and discomfort. She glanced at Meredith while working on Julie's shoulder and Meredith awaited the question that had been thrown at her from what felt like pretty much everyone she'd met today. But Callie didn't ask her how she was doing and merely nodded at them when she had instructed Julie how to look after her dressing. Meredith felt relieved. She didn't want to have her messy life drawn up in front of her patients, which, coming to think of it, was something that used to happen way too often.

As they left Callie's exam room and headed for Julie's CT scan, Meredith paged Derek and he stood already outside the tiny booth when they got there. Meredith hadn't seen him since they had parted in the lobby in the morning. Despite his stubborn words at the breakfast table still ringing in her mind, that casual smile of his made her body tingle. Rushing the feeling off, she smiled at him and bent down to Julie.

"Julie, this is Dr. Shepherd. He's a brain specialist and he's gonna help me read your scans, okay?" Julie began to nod, but winced and held her head still.

"My head... it hurts," she whispered anxiously. Her eyes were wide and Meredith could see that the tough exterior she seemed eager to maintain was starting to crackle. She was careful to sound reassuring when she calmly asked Julie to describe the pain. The girl closed her eyes and concentrated on lying still. "It's like a headache, like when you have the flu. It kinda throbs." Meredith took the girl's hand in hers and squeezed it quickly.

"We're gonna look at your scans now and then we'll see what we can do about it, okay? Are you ready to go inside the tube? You need to lie completely still for a while. Can you do that?" Julie mumbled in agreement, her eyes still closed. Meredith pressed the button and went out to the room where Derek stood waiting for the pictures to appear. He didn't see her coming and Meredith stopped in the doorway, taking in his tired appearance as he scanned the computer screen. A distant observer wouldn't have noticed - after all, he was McDreamy - but Meredith knew that the lines around his eyes hadn't been present only a week ago. _What happened to you? Meredith. Meredith is what happened to me. _She tried to shook off the feeling as he turned and saw her standing there, a little smile playing in the corner of his mouth. She entered the room and looked through the window at Julie, who lay perfectly still in the machine. "She has a broken collarbone from falling from a climbing frame, and she experiences headaches and dizziness," she told Derek, who searched the scans that now appeared on the screen. He pointed at the computer.

"Doesn't look like a bleeding. The brain tissue seems to have been in motion, it might be a little swollen."

"Brain concussion?" Meredith asked, relieved that it didn't appear to be a more serious injury. Derek nodded.

"It seems so. What treatment would you suggest?"

"Well, a broken collarbone doesn't require a hospital stay," began Meredith, "but she needs to be on bed-rest and a possible swelling in the brain should be observed overnight by checking her pulse, BP and pupils so no complications arise." Derek nodded contentedly and ordered her to admit Julie and call her parents. Meredith hesitated. "Her mom doesn't seem... I don't know. Julie wouldn't let me contact her before. I got a feeling they might not have the easiest relation." Derek looked solemnly at her.

"It doesn't matter. She's underage and we're keeping her overnight. Her parents must be informed. Should Julie need to undergo any procedure due to complications, we need their consent." Meredith nodded. Knowing he was right, she turned and went to release Julie from the machine, feeling Derek's eyes burning into her back. She didn't know why, but she couldn't help herself from turning around again. As she had known, he was looking at her, his lips curled. She tried to read his gaze. Before - before Addison, before Finn, before the water - he would have had _that_ look. Like he saw her naked. Like all he wanted to do was to take her to the nearest on-call room. That look used to be pretty much all she could think about during long surgeries when their eyes met above their surgical masks. Some of those first year surgeries that were supposed to be unforgettable experiences? Completely blank. And it was not even about the sex. It was about the moment afterward, when the world stopped. When it just felt so safe. She didn't think she could read any of this in Derek's eyes now.

"Meredith." His voice startled her. His smile had faltered and he had tilted his head slightly. "Are you okay?" When she didn't answer right away, he frowned and reached out for her hand. All she could read from him was care and concern. She didn't like that. She didn't want that. She didn't even need that, despite what everybody seemed to assume. "Do you want to talk about it?" Caring and concern. That meant talking. Dealing. Sharing. All those things that were the last she wanted to do. And apparently, all that Derek had in mind these days. She only wanted him to page her to an on-call room his next free period, as he used to. But somehow, she couldn't quite find the courage to just tell him that. There was something about this morning. And the morning before that. He wasn't avoiding, exactly. He just seemed... a little distracted. Not quite in the mood. She realized that his hand now had travelled up to her face, cupping her chin and she snapped out of her gaze.

"I'm fine. I should go get my patient." She gave him a quick flickering smile. He let his hand drop and jerked his head slowly in a quiet agreement. Meredith avoided his eyes and turned again to let Julie out. "Hey there," she greeted the girl as the bunk appeared. "You did great in there." Julie smiled a little. She seemed calmer than before, and Meredith hadn't yet helped her over to her own bed again before she asked about the results. Meredith was a little surprised over this practical view from such a young patient but was happy that she didn't have bad news. "You're gonna be fine, Julie. You have a brain concussion, which explains why you're feeling dizzy and a little sick. It's gonna pass in a few days and until then you'll be on bed-rest. We'd like to keep an eye on you overnight, so I'm gonna go get you a room, okay?" Something flashed over Julie's face, but Meredith couldn't really tell if it was relief or disappointment or both. It was gone in an instant and the girl shrugged warily, cautious not to move too much.

"Yeah, I guess." She seemed like she wanted to say something more, but instead she closed her eyes and relaxed against her pillows. Meredith looked down at her, noticing that her features looked a little strained. She once again felt that there was something about her patient that she couldn't put her finger on and that she didn't know how to act on. Instead of pressing it, she wheeled Julie's bed back to the elevators, hoping that the even motion would comfort her a little.

-----

Meredith was kept rather busy during early afternoon with a stream of patients coming into the E.R. with more or less extensive injuries. She dwelt a little over the fact that none of them proved surgical and could only assume that today was going to be a pretty mellow day. After having discharged an older man with a bad cut, the pit seemed temporarily pretty quiet and Meredith steered her way up to the patients' rooms, wanting to check on Julie and make sure she was doing okay. The girl had seemed calm, though tired, when she had left, but she had looked so lonely in the bed in the middle of the room. Julie's door was open and Meredith peered carefully into the room, not wanting to disturb if Julie was asleep. She wasn't, though. She sat up in bed, her legs pulled up and her uninjured arm wrapped around them and she stared stubbornly at the nurse that stood in front of her. Hoping she wasn't interrupting anything, Meredith entered the room. The nurse turned to her, rolling her eyes.

"Good that you came, Dr. Grey," she said. "Julie keeps asking for you, but I told her we can't page doctors for minor things." Meredith frowned.

"You shouldn't have hesitated to get me if there was something. I was gonna check on her anyway." She walked over to Julie's bed. "How are you feeling?"

"She just needs to undress," the nurse answered before Julie could say anything. She looked pointedly at Meredith. "I told you it was nothing doctor related." Meredith looked at Julie. Though she had taken off her mudded sneakers before getting into bed, she was still dressed in the jeans and large sweater she had come in. Meredith saw the anxious yet stubborn look in her eyes and turned to the nurse.

"It's okay. I'm not busy for the moment, I can take it from here." As the nurse cast a doubtful look at her and disappeared, she sat down at Julie's bed. At a closer look, she saw that the sweater had a hole at the elbow and the jeans were pretty scruffy, probably from the fall earlier. Actually, Julie's face and hands bore evidence from the fall as well. "Julie," Meredith began gently after a slight hesitation, "would you like me to help you wash some of that dirt off? It might be a little hard for you using your hands as usual." Julie looked down at her hands, first now discovering what Meredith had seen, smiled a little and nodded. Meredith returned the smile and rose from the bed to go get a mirror and some cleaning equipment from the bathroom. She carefully cleansed Julie's hands, dabbing a few minor cuts with an antiseptic. "I hope it doesn't hurt that much. What do you say, would you like some help with your face as well?" She let Julie look into the mirror, causing the girl to let out a giggle.

"Have I gone around like this all day?" she asked. Meredith smiled.

"I didn't even see it until now, so it's not that bad. Or maybe both you and me were too wrapped up in the whole arm thing to really notice," she suggested, which made Julie giggle again. She helped Julie to wash her face and put the utensils on the table next to the mug of water and the pillbox already standing there.

"Dr. Grey? Will you help me with my clothes?" Julie looked at her. "They're so messy. I mean, I know you're a doctor and everything, and I guess I could ask a nurse..." Meredith smiled warmly.

"I have some time. Now let's see. I'm afraid your clothes got a little damaged when you fell. Would you like to slip into a gown instead?" Julie nodded half-heartedly and let Meredith help her out of her sweater. It had a shade of deep pink and featured a smiling Cookie Monster. Meredith couldn't quite get the somewhat childish sweater to match Julie's a little clumsy make-up and hairsprayed ponytail, carefully arranged to look casual. She tried to remember how she had dressed as a twelve year old and could only picture herself in tight tops and with socks in her bra in desperate attempts not to seem so young. She pushed the memory aside and concentrated on Julie again. "When you're wearing a collar like this, it's always best to start undress the arm that is injured," she advised. "Then you can just drag the rest of it off." She noticed that Julie, despite the trust she seemed to have in her, seemed a little self-conscious when it came to taking off her shirt. Meredith well remembered the awful P.E:s in middle school when there was nothing to do but undress in front of all the other girls and tried to make the procedure quick and smooth for the girl. Once they were done, Meredith draped Julie's clothes over a chair, not missing the girl's expression when she saw the dirt and the holes.

"Mom will kill me for tearing that sweater," she said before she could stop herself. Her tone was voiceless and Meredith looked cautiously at her, waiting for her to continue, but she didn't.

"I'm sure it won't matter that much to her when she hears you're alright," she tried, but only got a shrug and a you-don't-get-it-look. But Meredith did get it. She didn't know Julie's mother, but she remembered her own, and she remembered her constant feelings of inferiority when growing up. She could very well imagine herself in an unknown environment at the age of twelve, hoping that her mother would show and dreading it at the same time. She sighed. How much she'd like to wait another moment, another hour, she couldn't put it off anymore. "Speaking of your mother," she said slowly, careful to register Julie's reactions. "I need to call her and tell her you're here." She expected some kind of protest from Julie's side, but the girl just nodded and didn't look at her. Meredith remained seated, unsure whether she should say anything or not, or if Julie wanted to talk, but minutes passed and Julie had closed her eyes, so Meredith stood up and walked quietly of of the room.

-----

Nurses and doctors that saw Meredith at the nurses' desk that afternoon eyed her curiously. She was standing with a pile of charts in front of her, but made no attempt to work on them. That day's second cup of coffee was standing next to the paperwork, but was yet untouched. Meredith seemed to be staring blankly at the wall and took no notice of what was going on around her. Not even when Dr. Sen from psych bumped into her by accident when he rushed past, she showed any reaction.

So she had called Julie's mother. The call had been full of impatient irritation and no concerned questions from Mrs. Fowler's side and an increasing unease from her own. She had been prepared to reassure, to explain that Julie wasn't in a bad shape, but along the way, she had grown more and more incredulous at the lack of care in Julie's mother's voice. She had almost heard her rolling her eyes, waiting to hang up and return to whatever important business she obviously was in the middle of. She had expected her to ask for visitor's hours; instead she had had to point out that they existed herself, only to be met with a distant thank you and nothing more. Though Julie had mentioned nothing in that way, Meredith had somehow known that she needed to know whether her mother was coming or not, which had been her only reason for asking Mrs. Fowler straight out. Which, she could conclude, had been totally meaningless. The answer had been a vague, half-hearted attempt to ensure Meredith she would try that wouldn't have convinced anyone. Although Meredith had tried to claim that it would mean a lot to Julie, she knew she hadn't sounded too convincing herself. Certainly, she knew it would. But she also knew that her mother's presence would most likely not cause Julie to relax or feel comfortable. When it had been obvious that Mrs. Fowler very soon would hang up on her, Meredith had made sure to let her know how good Julie was. That she was someone to be proud of. The silence in the other end had filled her with sadness and increased the frustration she'd felt during the entire call.

_That girl's clumsiness never stops to surprise me. How many times have I told her not to bother me while at work? _Meredith wasn't sure whether it was the voice of Julie's mother or of her own ringing in her head. She closed her eyes and tried as hard as she could to avoid going to her dark and twisty place. When she opened them again, Derek was standing in front of her, concerned written all over his face. Meredith was taken aback by his presence and stirred, almost falling over by the sudden movement and from standing up for so long. Derek caught her by her shoulders and didn't let go.

"Are you okay?" They both knew it wasn't really a question, even if Meredith almost automatically told him that she was fine. But before she could stop herself, instead something completely else slipped out of her.

"Do you think it's possible for a mother not to love her child?" Derek eyed her warily, unsure of where this conversation would take them and of what the right thing to say would be. Meredith squirmed, smoothing an invisible wrinkle of her scrubs, already regretting letting her guard down, yet couldn't bring herself to just smooch what hang in the air between them. Derek cleared his throat, wanting to ask what made her pose such a question. Yet he was almost sure that would make her turn, or run, or smile politely and change the subject. That she didn't had already was surprising and Derek thought she deserved a real answer. Meredith's hands were still on the charts she's been holding on to for what felt like an eternity, as were her eyes, even though Derek didn't think she could make even a coherent guess on what they were holding.

"I think it's possible, yes," he said carefully. "Unusual. But possible." He made a pause, trying to read her expression. "Meredith..." She shook her head and gave him a fleeting smile.

"Never mind," she said quickly. "I gotta go. I have been standing here far too long." She turned, lifted the pile of charts and almost staggered under their weight, but seemed unable to move.

"Meredith," Derek said quietly, disappointed that his answer obviously hadn't been the right one, the one that had made her stay and talk to him. "Are you okay?" he repeated, but before she could answer, she felt her cell phone vibrate against her scrubs. She frowned at the low buzzing. She didn't use to have it switched on at work unless she expected a call. Which, considering that pretty much the only ones who called her were Derek or Cristina, she almost never did. She picked up the phone, relieved to have an excuse to get away from Derek and the tiring attempts to avoid his questions. Those caring, concerned questions that she so didn't need right now.

"I'm fine," she said quickly. He was pretty sure that was a lie, but he couldn't do anything before she cast an apologetic glance at him and rounded the corner of the hall before answering the call.

"Dr. Grey?" a pleasant, deep voice Meredith vaguely recognize but couldn't place said. "Dr. Grey, this is Ms. Henry. From your mother's nursing home." Meredith was quiet for a moment, not able to bring herself to reply. "Dr Grey? Is this a bad time?" the nurse asked, used to Meredith's excuses from several other conversations they had had with each other over the phone the past years. Meredith swallowed and regained her voice.

"No, it's fine. Um... I'm sorry, I... Did you have something in mind?" She rolled her eyes at herself for not pulling a coherent sentence together. Obviously the nurse had something in mind since she had made the call. She could almost hear the laughter in the other woman's voice as she spoke again.

"Actually I did." She became serious again. "Dr. Grey, I want to start with saying how sorry I am for your loss. We enjoyed having your mother here with us." Before Meredith could answer, she went on. "I hope this isn't too soon for you or too painful, but we need to clear her room for... " She broke off. "We were wondering if you could come pick her things up. They're yours now, you know." Meredith knew what she had been about to say. They needed to clear her room for another resident. Someone else would take over the tiny space that had been her mother's for five years. Unexpectedly, that filled her with sadness and she cleared her throat.

"Um... I don't know if..." she began, not really sure of which excuse would be the most convincing.

"Meredith, I don't doubt this may be hard on you," Ms. Henry said. "But you have to do it eventually and frankly, I think it would be the best closure for you to do it while the room is still intact." She continued with a smile, foreseeing what Meredith was to bring up next. "I know you're a surgical intern and that your time isn't your own, but..." Meredith wanted to kick herself for not being able to come up with anything else than to reluctantly agree.

"Fine. I can come by tonight. I'm off at 7.30."

"That's great," Ms Henry said happily. "Then we expect to see you later tonight."

"Yeah. I'll try. I'll definitely try." Meredith hanged up and glared at her phone. If only it had been switched off. Then she wouldn't have had to deal with this today. But apparently she had to. She spotted a dark, messy ponytail waiting for the elevator and quickened her pace. "Meet me at Joe's at 7.30," she hissed in Cristina's ear as the elevator opened and let out a swarm of people. Cristina turned around with raised eyebrows.

"Not that I wouldn't be there anyway, but what's going on? I'm the one with a wedding in just a couple of days, you know. I win."

"Not this time," Meredith answered darkly. "Dead mommy's talking to me from beyond the grave." Cristina looked incredulously at her.

"Fine. You win," she said slowly. "And I wanna hear all about it."

-----

Cristina was already sitting at the bar when Meredith entered. The little space was not yet crowded even if several tables were filled. As Meredith made her way through the room, she could hear an upbeat song that she didn't recognize playing in the background. It didn't really fit with the way she was feeling. If anything, her life was a downbeat right now.

"I really need some tequila tonight, Joe," Meredith claimed as she reached the counter. Before sitting down, she quickly scanned the bar. Even though she thought she knew some giggling nurses at a nearby table, she couldn't make out any more familiar faces in the dim light. She sank down at the chair next to her friend and dropped her bag at her feet.

"That's what you say every time." She didn't have to look at the bar owner to know the amused and slightly concerned expression on his face. He used to put that face on every time she came into the bar. Or at least every time she ordered tequila. Which was every time she came into the bar. Sometimes she spilled some of her worries over the counter, but tonight Cristina was sitting next to her, impatiently waiting for her to share and she just smiled at Joe as he poured her liquor and placed the shot in front of her.

"You're freaking out," Cristina stated when Meredith downed her glass and motioned to Joe for another one. Meredith just groaned and put her head in her hands. "Okay, what exactly did dead mommy say to you?" she said when Meredith didn't attempt to reply. She bent forward, her eyes shining intriguingly. "And - how?" Meredith glared at her.

"The nurse from her home called. They want me to pick up her things." She licked her lips to feel some of the lingering liquor taste and wondered if there was any excuse for not going that wouldn't make her feel guilty tomorrow.

"Oh." Cristina sipped at her beer in silence for a while, whipping her foot up and down under the table, making Meredith a little nervous. "So what are you gonna do?"

"I don't know. It's _her_ things. What should I do with them?" Cristina shrugged, not sure if the question was rhetorical or not.

"Whatever you did with her other things?" When Meredith eyed her suspiciously, she motioned impatiently at some uncertain aim. "Those boxes Izzie always complained about before. That she tried to unpack, even." Meredith darkened slightly at the memory of George and Izzie hunting her down, nagging about decorations and paintings. They had tried to make the house homey. Meredith hadn't really seen the point. It had never been a homey place; mostly shadows and dark corners and no sounds except for the music and the T.V. she used to switch on as soon as she came home.

"I put them in the den. They're still there. Izzie had no business unpacking them. I didn't. That's what I mean. It's her stuff. Not mine." The den had certainly not been homey. True, it had once been a place with a tempting shimmer. She used to sit outside it at late nights and imagine all the important things her mother was doing in there. After that time her mother had bawled out at her for not minding her own business, however, it had become a place she carefully avoided.

"Do you want me to come with you?" Cristina asked. "I could take a look, tell you the scary findings." Meredith shook her head.

"Nobody's looking. I'm just gonna go there and... throw her things in a box and put it in the den. With closed eyes." She glared annoyed at Cristina when she snorted into her glass. Throwing down her second tequila shot and battling with herself whether to order in one more or not, she sighed and decided to get this over with. "Now. I'm gonna do it now." Without waiting for Cristina's reply, she walked out of the bar, put her bag in the backseat of her car and climbed into the driver's seat. "Now," she repeated to herself.

-----


	2. Back In Time

_A/N - So this is my second chapter. It's been a long time, and it might be like that between chapters as I obviously am a terribly slow writer. But I'm not gonna abandon the story, so hang in there even if it will take forever. I thought this chapter would be shorter than my last, but it turns out it became much longer than expected. I was gonna let Derek appear in the end of this chapter, but I had to rearrange some scenes to not make this too long. So this is completely Mer-centric. Next chapter she will have some interaction with humans as well as with old memories, I promise. _

_Thanks for all nice reviews! They make me ridiculously happy and keep me writing. It's interesting to see what you all think, so please share. Anyway, this chapter takes place immediately after the last one ended, so it's not that much to say about it. Simply read and enjoy. And PM me if you find any errors :) _

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Meredith turned off the ignition and pulled out the key. She lingered in the car seat, looking out the window at the rain that so often filled the skies of Seattle and feeling comfort in the splattering on the car roof. She had always liked rain. Even as a child, she could stand outside with her face tilted upwards, her eyes closed, and try to feel the salty drops on her tongue. Her mother usually told her off for doing that. Even though she seemed to be at the hospital all of her time, she complained of the rain whenever she got a chance. None of her friends had understood her fascination either. They had always tugged her jacket and urged her to hurry, or left her standing on the road, running towards the warmth inside. Coming to think of it, the other interns didn't seem that keen of rain either. Izzie used to drag her capuche over her head even the short bit between the entrance and the car, even though she had lived her whole life in Washington and should be used to it. And Derek cast her funny looks whenever she stopped to catch some raindrops.

She sighed and stepped out of the car and reached for her bag in the backseat. It was more out of habit than for thinking she might need something in it. Her ID was unnecessary; the nurses knew her well by now. Usually, they even seemed eager to chat with her whenever she came. Sometimes she had given in, but most of the times, she had already compromised with her time and her conscious felt bad enough. She hadn't wanted her mother to wait any longer than she already had. Not that she had been aware of the frequency of her visitors or even of the purpose with them. Meredith wasn't sure of why she had even bothered to visit whenever she had a day off. Her mother hadn't exactly been a mama bear. But she had managed to alienate everybody else in her life. And she had asked Meredith to keep her Alzheimer's a secret. There was no one else. But deep down, Meredith knew that those hadn't been her only reasons for having visited her mother regularly. Alzheimer's had really been a cruel joke of fate. Back in the days, Ellis had barely noticed Meredith's existence, and if she had, complained about it. After her diagnosis, she had even had an excuse for doing so. Whether she really wanted to admit it or not, Meredith knew she had spent her life seeking her mother's approval and confirmation. Though she should have realized that at this time, it was kind of pointless to keep doing that, there had still been this hope lingering in her mind that her mother would recognize her efforts. That she would like her.

She considered leaving her bag in the car. It wasn't as if any of the Roseridge residents would wander the parking lot and steal it. Well, at least she had some aspirins in it. She felt like they could be of use before the night was over. With her hands thrust in her coat pockets and face hidden in her thick, knitted scarf, Meredith slowly made her way up the slushy driveway. She felt gratitude for her scarf. After Finn and Derek had effectively taken her mind of knitting-in-celibacy, Izzie hadn't given up on it. When she had finished both her and Meredith's sweaters, she had started her next knitting project. She had given the striped scarf to Meredith only a few days before the triage and insisted that she should wear it. Meredith knew she had her own outerwear somewhere in the house, but she hadn't had the heart to let Izzie down.

She saw the big red brick house appear behind the curve and felt the same mix of emotions that she always had felt all those times she had walked this way. She knew her mother had been taken care of here. The nurses were kind and genuinely interested in their residents. She could have found much worse homes for her. Still, it wasn't like this it was meant to be, having to visit your mother in a home when you were only 30. Your mother should have her own home, her own life. Your mother should be there for you when you needed it. Given that Ellis Grey had been nothing but a regular mom, Meredith knew it wouldn't have been that way. At least now, she didn't have to get in those fights they always seemed to had in her teens. And she didn't have to defend her ordinariness over and over again. There were some advantages with a mother that didn't recognize her after all. She grimaced at her cynicism and stopped outside the solid iron door. It was decorated with a small chiseled rose and a little glass window on the top. Meredith could see movements inside, a nurse who studied the notice board and a few residents in the living room sofa. The dimmed spots in the ceiling spread a soft light over the carefully decorated hallway and made the dark outside seem so much colder. Meredith shivered. She took a deep breath and reached for the door handle. She could do this. Rip off the bandage. No anesthesia. She closed her eyes for a second before she opened the door and stepped into the warmth.

It was quiet in there. The only sounds Meredith could hear were a low mumbling from the two ladies and the rustling of papers from behind the desk. The blond nurse who sat there – the one who didn't look a day over 20 – looked up at her and smiled.

"Good evening Meredith."She frowned pensively for a moment, as if she wondered what business Meredith could still have there, before she continued. "Ah, you must be here about your mother's things. Ms Henry told us you would come by tonight." She rose from her chair and motioned for Meredith to follow her. "I'm really sorry. We will miss Ellis," she added, her voice soft and sincere.

Meredith smiled mechanically, but wondered if what the nurses said really was true. There were certainly not many people that had known her mother when she wasn't sick that would say that. She couldn't come up with any reply and they wandered the way to Ellis's room in silence. Meredith could recognize every notch in the hand rail and she automatically avoided the steps that creaked. She felt a pang of sorrow. This wasn't her home, but it had been her mother's. She doubted that her mother had known the stairs well enough to sneak down in the evenings without being seen. When she still had been too little to be alone home, she had made it an art to sneak down without disturbing her mother, but as she had become older, Ellis had not hesitated to work long and late hours and she had seldom had any mother downstairs to hide from. The rattling sound of the key in the door made her stir and she quickly shook off her memories.

"Here it is," the nurse announced a little unnecessarily. "Would you like me to help you take in the boxes?" Meredith looked at her, totally taken aback. She hadn't thought at all of bringing boxes or cleaning equipment or anything at all, really. She hopefully scanned the room, but all she could glimpse was her mother's tarnished suitcase under the bed. It wouldn't do for everything she would need to put in it.

The nurse seemed to catch her embarrassment. "It'll be alright," she quickly said. "We had a resident moving in a couple of days ago and his boxes are still here. I'm sure he'll let you use them." Meredith opened her mouth to protest, but suddenly felt so tired and already overwhelmed with so much of her mother in a day, that she only nodded.

"If you are sure... I mean, I don't want to be... " She quieted, searching for the word, but the nurse shook her head and made ready to leave.

"You won't. I'm sure Philip will be glad to get rid of those boxes. I'll be back with them so you can get about." The nurse disappeared and Meredith pressed her hand against her face. Her head already throbbed and she felt incredibly stupid. To her surprise, she found that she wanted Derek to be there with her. Derek would not have forgotten to bring boxes, and if he had, he would have known how to fix it. He would have told her that it was nothing to be ashamed of. She had gotten the call at work, for God's sake. It wasn't like she used to bring boxes to work just in case. He would have told her all this that she already actually knew, but couldn't convince herself about. Yet, she hadn't invited him to come. She hadn't told him she was going. It was her mother, her business and she could handle it. Well, apparently not that well, but still. He shouldn't have to be involved in this messy... whatever, that was her mother.

She sat down at the bed and looked around the room. It looked pretty much like the last time she had been here. Her mother had been lucid then. She had been lucid and Meredith had had to tell her a horrible truth. She had made her mother unhappy. Meredith could remember her panic when her mother had sunk down. It had been a panic coming from the knowledge that she couldn't do much without equipment and help from other doctors. But at least she had known why. It was not like when she had been a child. She had understood that she wasn't able to help her mother, but she hadn't known why. She had tried hard, but she had never succeeded. Her mother had been unhappy all the time. Maybe she hadn't been the one to make her unhappy, but she certainly had never been the one to make her happy, either. Meredith sighed. It didn't do her any good to dwell on things like these. It was better to get this over with. She tried to decide where would be a good place to start and her eyes fell on the closet, whose door rested ajar. Clothes. That shouldn't be too intimidating. She could start there. She rose from the bed, starting to smooth the wrinkles she'd made before realizing that she would have to clean out the bed later anyway. The closet was pretty full and smelled tidily and maybe a little old-fashioned. The blouses were ordered neatly on their hangers. She took them out one by one, folded them carefully and placed them in a heap on the bed. There was nothing she wanted. Maybe she could give them away to Salvation Army or something. The blouses didn't really remind her of her mother; she hadn't dressed so prim before she got sick. She did the same with all her mother's trousers, her skirts and her night gowns that were all silky and of fine quality. Not exactly like the cotton shirts she sometimes slept in herself. She put aside the dressing gown that hanged in the back and stopped in her tracks. Behind the dressing gown, now the only garment left, was a set of dark blue scrubs.

Meredith stared at it a couple of seconds. It could have been Derek's, except that she never would find Derek's scrubs in his personal closet. Well, of course it was also smaller than any scrubs Derek could ever fit into. She carefully took the scrubs down and held them. The fabric was clean and smelled freshly ironed. She wondered if her mother had asked to have it washed every now and then; if it cheered her up. If she remembered. It certainly would have made her happier. She lifted the shirt to fold it and noticed that her mother's ID was still clipped to it. The picture must have been taken a good ten years ago. Her mother's hair had been longer and straighter and her skin smoother. She looked sternly at Meredith from the photo. It was not hard to understand that she had been a solemn, maybe intimidating doctor. Yet, she looked brighter in the picture than Meredith could ever recall seeing her at home. There was an aura of ease around her, one that her own daughter obviously hadn't been able to evoke in her.

Meredith bit her lip and studied the picture more carefully, almost despite her will. She could see the resemblance that everyone who had met her mother used to remind her of. In twenty years, maybe she would look just like that. She wondered if Derek resembled any of his parents. She had never seen any picture; Derek didn't talk much about his family. Back when they first started to go out, she had been craving for information. Not until Addison showed up, it had dawned on her why he had been so quiet about his past and after that, well, they had been pretty busy just figuring out themselves to really talk about other stuff. His stuff, that was. Her stuff, he seemed remarkably interested in. She sighed and took a second look at the photograph in her hand. Had her mother seen herself in her when she grew up? Or had she seen Thatcher? She didn't know actually. Meredith's friends had used to complain of their mothers' obsession with their clothes or style, but until the point she came home with her hair several shades pinker than it had even been, she never had to think about those things. She had stopped asking for her mother's opinion when she was about seven. She had known by then that the only answers she would get was 'That's fine, Meredith' or 'I'm busy right now, Meredith'.

A light knock on the door stirred her and she looked up from the ID she still held in her hand. The door swung open and the nurse stuck in her head.

"I'm sorry it took some time. Philip was more than happy to help you out, though. We managed to locate four boxes. Do you think that will be enough?" She smiled broadly at Meredith, who got up from the bed and nodded slowly.

"Thank you so much," she said earnestly. "I didn't know what I was thinking, coming here without anything at all." She took the cartons the nurses struggled with and placed them on the floor beneath the bed. The nurse lingered in the door opening, but Meredith gave her a little smile. "I'll be fine. I'll try to finish as fast as I can."

When she heard the nurse's footsteps grow distant in the hallway, she picked up the first box and started to set it up. While she worked, she tried to empty her mind but it was not as easy as she would like it to be. Not as easy as with a little help from a tequila bottle. Her lips suddenly felt dry and she licked repeatedly to soften them while she put all her mother's clothes in a box. She carefully folded the scrubs and put them in the box she'd prepared for things she wanted to keep. She avoided to look at the ID again and instead searched for something else to pack, hopefully something that wouldn't bring any surprises this time. The bathroom seemed like a safe place. She peered cautiously inside. It looked like it used to. Her mother's little makeup box stood on the shelf. It had been a gift from Meredith a couple of years ago and apparently it had not been despised. Her mother hadn't used much makeup. A mascara tub Meredith was pretty sure was too old to be used lay there together with a lipstick in a shade called coral and a pair of tweezers. A light blue toothbrush rested in a mug on the sink and a few tubes of day cream could be glimpsed next to a shampoo bottle behind the half open mirror above. Apart from the difference in size, the tiny space actually resembled the bathroom that used to be her mother's back when they both lived in the house. It was clean and spartan and held no more personal belongings than absolutely necessary. Meredith didn't consider herself a messy person when it came to things or rooms, like Cristina was, but as a teenager, her bathroom had flooded with makeup, hair dyes and various garments and necklaces she every morning had had a hard time choosing among. It was probably a good thing her mother never entered there.

She made a quick calculation of which things to keep and which to throw away, and rather than going to get a box inside the bathroom, she pulled the wastepaper basket beneath the sink and started shoving things in it. She worked efficiently, thankful for the absence of potential triggers of unwanted memories and soon, the bin was full and the shelves were empty. She strung together the bag and balanced the few items she'd decided to keep in her arms as she walked out in the bedroom again. She placed them on top of the scrubs and shook her head. The box looked pathetically empty. She cast a glance at her wristwatch and sighed. It was already half past nine. She'd better keep up her pace or she wouldn't be out of here until the middle of the night. She was resolutely determined to finish tonight. Spending another night like this wasn't an option. She fought the urge to sit down on the bed to rest a couple of minutes and started wandering the room, pulling out all drawers and sorting the content. For each drawer she was about to look into, she had to ignore the increasing jolts in her stomach. It was like one of those curves on the charts she had to study each day to determine the status of her patients. It had a steady, regular rhythm. Opening the drawer got her to the maximum point, realizing there was nothing in there that had any particular meaning to her, the curve slowly decreased until it shot way back up again when her hand rested on the next drawer. There were not that many drawers to open, however, or a lot of shelves to empty. Half an hour later, Meredith had managed to split up the room into three boxes, including the several painting that had decorated the walls. The one that was intended for the waste was almost full and the one she had reserved for things that could be given away was still a lot heavier than the one she placed things she wanted to keep in. The only thing she hadn't sorted out was the bookcase.

She sighed heavily at the sight of all books stored on the three broad, wooden shelves. The top shelf held mostly paperbacks of various sorts. Meredith didn't know if her mother had read them while in Roseridge. She certainly hadn't bothered relaxing with a fiction book back when Meredith was young. She didn't think she once had seen her mother sitting in the sofa reading and she couldn't think that it would have been Rosamunde Pilcher, Agatha Christie or P.G. Woodhouse or any of these legible authors now standing in a pretty row on her bedside. She shrugged and placed the books in the Salvation Army box.

At the sight of the middle shelf, she raised her eyebrows. Mostly when she'd visited her mother, they'd sat in the living room downstairs, but she still had been up here numerous times and she hadn't noticed the large number of medical books now placed in the bookcase. She certainly hadn't brought them there, but the confusion of who might have done it was over-shadowed by her curiosity of the books. She bent down and took a closer look. A few of the books she recognized from Dartmouth, but many of them had she never seen before. _Key Topics in General Surgery, Lecture Notes on General Surgery, Essentials of General Surgery, Clinical Cases Uncovered_... The list could be made long. Bailey would probably know them all, Meredith thought, preferring not to think about how much she still had to learn before she could even be half the surgeon her mother had been. She hadn't even chosen a specialty yet. She briefly wondered when Derek had gone into neuro, and why. They had actually never spoken about that and from what Cristina said, her mother thought you could tell a lot from a person from what specialty they chose. Sadly, their conversation had never steered into the depths of the choice of neurosurgery. Maybe it was for the best, Meredith thought grimly. She wasn't particularly fond of the idea of Cristina and her mother discussing Derek; she had a feeling the discussion wouldn't result in any good conclusions. She quickly returned to the books without lingering at that thought and glanced through the rest of the medical literature. Some of it looked new, but many books were worn and well-read. She could probably sell them cheap if she didn't want to keep them. When she was a medical student, she had tried to buy most of her textbooks second hand to keep the expenses down. She knew many students welcomed that opportunity and would be grateful for those books, but she wasn't yet sure she wanted to get rid of them, so she put them all in the last empty box to save.

The bottom shelf contained not so much yet another row of books, but instead note pads and notebooks and a couple of binders. Meredith quickly scanned the binders' content and found that it mostly held receipts from smaller purchases, some cut newspaper articles and postcards. Some of the nurses had probably made her mother somewhere to store all those little things that otherwise would just have been lying around. She hesitated, but picked up the notebook with red stripes and flipped the first page open. Nothing. The book looked new and not used. She flipped through it, but could find no sign of her mother's neat handwriting. The notepads only contained small lists of things to do or items to buy, mostly written by some nurse that hadn't bothered to rip the page out later. She threw the unused notebooks in the box to save and after a slight hesitation, she did the same with the binders. She could go through the content later and maybe use the binders for something else.

The only item left in the bookcase now was a small book with thick covers. Meredith frowned, but as soon as she picked it up she recognized it. She smiled a little. It was the photo album she had brought what felt like a lifetime ago, to help her mother remember some of their life together. She had seen the photos several times before, but she couldn't resist opening the album. There she was, a one year old with a passy in her mouth, resting in her father's knee. A two year old at the kitchen table, naked except for her diaper, eating from a small bowl shaped like a frog and grinning at the camera. On the next page, her slightly older self held a balloon striped in red, white and blue and she stood in front of her mother in a sun-shadowed lawn. Her mother wore one of her rare smiles. She must have gotten the day off and decided to celebrate Fourth of July like normal people, a custom she hadn't kept when Thatcher left. She turned the page and saw herself as a preschooler, wrapped up in her favorite blanket and full of chickenpox blisters. Thatcher must have taken that picture as well, he was the one who had stayed at home with her, making her ice cream and letting her watch television and bathed her in oatmeal to ease the itching she had found so uncomfortable. She flipped through the pages, stopping once in a while to take a closer look. There she was with her parents outside the house, sitting in her red wagon. There was her mother in scrubs. Thatcher in trunks at a crowded beach. Herself in the bathtub, sticking her tongue at the camera.

Her mother hadn't recognized any of those photos. She knew that it hadn't been on purpose, but she couldn't help the small feeling of resentment that popped up to the surface. She shook her head vehemently, unceremoniously throwing the album on the bed as if it was contagious. The pages began to flip until the album was closed save for the back cover. Meredith sighed at her own reaction, feeling childish, and reached forward to shut it properly. With her arms already halfway in motion, she stopped and frowned suddenly. There was something strange with the back cover. It seemed to bulge. She placed the album in her knee again and examined it closer. There was some kind of pocket hidden in the cover, so thin and with such an invisible line it wasn't strange she had never seen it before. She carefully loosed the opening and felt with her fingers inside. She managed to get a grip of the photos that she felt resided there without ripping anything apart and slowly pulled them out.

An ominous feeling was creeping up her spine, but she tried to blank her mind and tell herself that whatever her mother had placed in there, it couldn't be anything bad. She didn't know why she needed to gather her courage before she could look at any of the pictures in her hand. It was just some stupid photos. Nothing to be scared of. _Rip off the bandage. No anesthesia._

Ellis and Richard. Her mother and her chief were what looked up at her from the first photo. Well, not so much looked up at her as looked at each other. At first, Meredith felt relief. This was no surprise to her. Not that looking at pictures of her mother with her lover was anything that came high on her list of priorities, but if this was the only Ellis had decided to keep private, she could deal with it. She thought. As long as the pictures didn't get too private, that was. She began to flip through the approximately ten photos in her hand, but she couldn't resist to take a closer look at each and one of them. The pictures were black and white and from what Meredith could tell, taken about twenty years ago. They were not professional photographs, and she guessed that Richard had taken the ones where Ellis posed alone, but Meredith wondered who had taken the ones that featured both of them. She couldn't think of anyone they would have involved in their affair, so she guessed that the most probable explanation was that they had used the self-timer on the camera. The photos seemed all to be taken at one occasion. Her mother was pretty, Meredith must admit, in a bell skirt in tweed and with her long hair loose over her shoulders. The young Richard looked handsome too, in a striped shirt with a loose collar.

She glanced back at the box where her mother's scrubs lay folded. And she had thought her mother looked bright in that photo. It couldn't even stand a comparison to these pictures. Her mother beamed and looked completely at ease. She looked into Richard's eyes, held his hands and seemed unaware of the camera, which Meredith found unlikely. Her mother was simply relaxed in a way Meredith had never seen her before. She hadn't been able to even imagine it. It wasn't happy. It was... the only word she could come up with was euphoria. Why was the English language so poor when you needed it?

She tried to remember Richard from when she was a child. If she closed her eyes, she could picture herself running around in the hospital, waiting for her mother to finish a surgery or a consult. She hadn't really minded all that waiting. The hospital was an interesting place and everybody was nice to her. She had explored all rooms she found exciting. The women working in the cafeteria had known her name and she could always nick some food if she was hungry. Sometimes she sat with her coloring books in the large conference room or at the nurses' station, but she usually forgot about her pens and pictures when nurses and doctors kept running around and talk about their stuff. She didn't understand half of it, but she found the words fascinating and used to roll them around in her mouth to taste them. Sometimes, when she had dinner with her mother, she asked her about some of the words she remembered. Ellis usually didn't bother to explain them properly to her, but occasionally, she could go into great detail about a surgical procedure or a interesting case. Meredith had loved those dinners. It made her feel almost like her mother's equal, like she was someone who counted.

Richard had been someone kind, someone who used to offer her sweets when he thought her mother wasn't around. He used to let her come into his office when he wasn't too busy and listened to her eager chatter with a quiet amusement. He was in many ways a total opposite to her mother, but he had been her true love. Even if she could have figured that out from the incoherent bits her mother's mind sometimes had let slip, here was the proof had she needed any. Her five year old self might had wanted Thatcher to stay, but he hadn't been the one for her mother.

Meredith looked through the rest of the photos in her knee. She meant to flip them quickly, but somehow, she found herself taking a closer look on each picture she picked up. After eight pictures of the young lovers – luckily, not all too private – she frowned when she noticed that the last item in her knee was a thin envelope. She slowly took it in her hand. _Ms Meredith Grey_ it said. It was addressed to her, to their house in Boston. She looked uncertainly at it. She couldn't remember getting much mail back in Boston, apart from occasional letters from those pen pals that everyone seemed to get in middle school, or more sporadic, postcards from her grandmother. She certainly didn't recognize the handwriting. She hesitated slightly. If this was meant for her and her mother had hidden it, what did it mean? Once again pushing the ominous thoughts that now were returning with full force back in her mind, she slowly opened the envelope. _No anesthesia._ The only thing inside it was a photograph. Why Ellis hadn't just put it together with the rest of the photos, Meredith didn't know. In contrast to the pictures featuring her mother and her lover, this photo was bright and colorful. It was a family photo. Two little girls. A blond, smiling woman. And her father.

Meredith took a sudden, shallow breath and closed her eyes. _Her father. _How could it be possible? She had asked him herself not that long ago._ Is there a box of unopened cards somewhere?_ He had denied it. Or had he? Suddenly, she couldn't tell what Thatcher had actually answered her. He had mostly stuttered incoherently, she recalled. She looked at the photo again, now steeling herself for the view. The girls were cute. The younger of them looked into the camera with a shy smile. Her golden brown hair was a little too short for any real haircuts, but still, it was combed sleek and two pink bows were attached to the sides. She fiddled with the hemline of her neat white dress where she sat in her mother's lap, her feet dangling and showing what appeared to be a pair of new, blank shoes in shiny red. Molly had been cute already at the age of three or four.

The older girl looked more confident. Her hair was darker than her sister's and fell over her shoulders. Meredith didn't even bother to pretend that she had to search for her name. Lexie. The one smart enough to go to medical school. She stood behind her father with her right hand on his left shoulder and her head slightly tilted to her side. Her sparkling smile revealed a gap between her two front teeth and she almost seemed to flirt with the camera in a way only six year olds can do.

She guessed that the family had been eternalized by a professional photographer. Maybe they did a photo a year. Like a family tradition. As far as she could recall, she had never done that herself until her graduation. It had been a waste of money really. She had sent pictures to her grandmother and to a couple of friends from home, but the larger part of that photo chart still lay somewhere in a drawer, forgotten and unused. She looked at her father's family again. The Grey family. Susan smiled up at her, younger and smoother, but she seemed as open and gentle as she had done at the hospital. Her father looked happy and more relaxed than she thought he had ever been when he still lived in their house. Had he been the one to send this? Or should she, going by the strange trying-to-be-mothering at the hospital, conclude that it was Susan? She turned the photo to look at its back, to see if there was anything written on it, but she found herself only staring at a blank sheet. Nothing there to explain why they had sent this to her. Or if this was an annual thing. Was there an additional heap of photos hidden somewhere, one for each year? She started to dig through the photo pocket again, suddenly feeling feverish and strangely excited, but even before she knew it was empty, she had stopped, realizing the meaningless. Her eyes fell on the envelope. She picked it up with trembling fingers and studied the post stamp closely. It took her a second to realize what date was printed there. It was the day before her birthday. Thatcher had sent this for her birthday. She took a deep breath and tried to remember that day.

Most of her birthdays hadn't been big deals, they came and went and were hard to distinguish from each other. But this one she actually remembered clearly, because it was the year her mother had decided to stop pretending that work didn't mean everything. She had turned eleven. Ellis had celebrated her in the morning, given her presents and explained that she had an important surgery that evening and that she wouldn't be home for dinner. Meredith had tried not to mind that she would be spending her eleventh birthday dinner alone and didn't object. She was eleven now, old enough to handle a night on her own. It wasn't like she hadn't done it before, anyway. She had shivered a little when she thought about all the lights she would have to turn on to make the house a little less scary, but she had waved goodbye to her mother as if it was nothing. But no time during that day had there been a mention of the letter she now held in her hand. And at all times that day, her mother had had it.

Meredith rested her head against the pillows. She felt like closing her eyes and let herself disappear. But the only option she had for the moment was the bliss of sleeping and she knew that she wouldn't be able to sleep even if her life depended on it. She let her gaze float around the room without really seeing anything at all. Why had Thatcher sent her this? She guessed there was no reason for her to try to find some explanation. She would never know if she was right or not. It wasn't like she would go over to Thatcher's house and ask him. Whatever. There was something else that burned in her mind and even though she was almost afraid to let herself go there, she couldn't help it from popping up. Why had Ellis kept this hidden from her? Why hadn't she told her? She had known that Meredith missed her father. That she wanted nothing more than to meet him again. At least at this point, when she hadn't turned into an angry teenager that didn't share one unnecessary thing with her mother. As a ten year old, she would have died for getting a life sign from her father. To get an explanation. Ellis _must_ have known that.

She dragged her hands through her hair as to clean her brain, to get some of her thoughts straight. Sure, the reasonable Meredith could think of reasons that Ellis could have used to defend her decision. She could have told herself Meredith would get her feelings hurt. That she would get her hopes up. Let her guard down. None of this were things that Ellis Grey would have wanted her daughter to do. None of this were things that Ellis Grey did. But the emotional Meredith, the one she usually tried to repress, felt a burning sensation stir inside of her and all she could do was clench her fists around the bed's edges. Even if her mother and she had lived in the same house, they actually didn't meet that often, due to her mother's loaded work burden. Of course there must have been a lot of things her mother didn't tell her. But the whole Richard affair that she had found out just a couple of months ago notwithstanding, she hadn't thought there were things she actually withheld. On purpose. She had been young after all. An adulterous love affair might not be what you chose as a topic for a dinner conversation with your five year old daughter. This was different.

A thousand feelings swirled around in her mind, making her almost faint. Her usual mechanisms for shutting out reality when it became too intrusive didn't seem to work this time. Her breath came in short, shallow gasps and she almost panicked because there was nothing she could do to help it. She had to gather all her strength before she could make an effort to calm down and think logical. So it hurt that her mother had hidden this from her. And as it hurt even more to think about what more things there could be that she hadn't been told, she actively shut that out of her mind. After all, she couldn't deny that she too had kept a thing or two to herself sometimes.

Suddenly, a long chain of events flashed before her mind; one by one they paraded and hooked onto each other like jigsaw pieces. It only lasted for a couple of seconds, but they etched in her mind nonetheless. Things she hadn't known she knew now each turned out to be a link in a long, merciless ant parade chain. Richard had been her mother's true love. And he had left her. Or rather, he had not left Adele for her, but the result was the same. What had happened afterwards, what then had been scary and inexplicable and utterly confusing, she now knew had been grief on Ellis's part. And then she had shut the world out. She had been too burned, too afraid, too emotionally stunted to let somebody into her life again. Not even her daughter had been granted access. Distance. Expectations instead of unconditional love. Admonishments instead of hugs. Arguments instead of heart-to-heart talks. All that was due to Ellis's inability to let herself trust and love. And as an effect, here she was, doing it all over again. She was raised that way. That was what she knew.

_She couldn't deny that she too had kept a thing or two to herself sometimes._ To almost everyone, she realized with a pang of horrifying clarification. Cristina, Derek... Everybody that was important to her. She shut them out. Sure, she'd known she used to keep things for herself. But she had thought it was for the best. That they didn't need to bother with her crap. She hadn't known that it hurt.

Derek. She had hurt Derek. She _was_ hurting him. It wasn't really comparable to, say, not mentioning your wife while wooing another woman but she tried her best to ignore that it might be another form of pain, to not be let in on the everyday struggle that you were supposed to share. It wouldn't surprise her if it was those small things that had made her mother's relationship with Richard not work.

She buried her head in her hands, feeling her chest ponder wildly and those shallow breaths she had managed to calm down return. Did she want a repeat of her mother's failure? Did she want the miserable life that would follow if she drove Derek away? A heavy shiver went through her body and she started to shudder violently. It was like an ice cold wind had made its way through the room even though there were no windows in Ellis's room and Meredith lost the grip of the photo with its freaking happy family. Even if she had wanted to, she found that there was no idea for her to try to find it, as everything in the room had suddenly become blurry from the tears in her eyes. Derek. She had to fix this with Derek. Without him, she was just a skinny blonde that men ragged up in bars – okay, that ragged up men in bars – that couldn't hold a relationship for more than a strictly limited time. To him, she was... someone to care about. Maybe even someone to love. Whatever. Her point was, she really had to fix this. Her _problem_ was, she couldn't think. And she had a feeling it was really important to think right now. She needed to think. But she couldn't. Even though her body was shivering and the hair on her bare arms stood right up from the goosebumps she always got on cold days, her face was hot and flushed and she just couldn't _think_. She rose from the bed and closing her eyes to get rid of the sudden faintness, she headed for the bathroom. Maybe it would be better if she only could splash a little cold water on her face.

The bathroom was dark but Meredith didn't bother to turn on the light. She didn't need it to find the sink and she was only grateful not to see her own face in the mirror. She had a feeling that she didn't quite look as presentable as she'd done when arriving earlier in the evening. She held her hands under the faucet only long enough for them to be wet, not wanting to feel colder than she already did. Even as the faucet had stopped dripping and her cheeks were absorbing the water, she heard splashing and smattering from somewhere distant. It still rained. The sound gave her comfort and made her feel somewhat better, until she remembered all the things she still needed to work out.

She needed to give Derek some clues. But the thing was, she couldn't count on him still being there for her if he knew. She couldn't expect that and she didn't. Sure, she might be the girl he loved, but love only did for a limited amount of sharing. She knew, rationally she knew, that he wouldn't turn around and walk out the door if she told him about some of the things he would insist on if he knew about them. He would be caring and concerned and all those things he was so good at. But he wouldn't be able to leave it there. He would prod and he would push and he would make her tell more things. He would never get enough and when she finally had spilled it all, she would be all soaked like a dishcloth. And God knows that was just what she didn't want to be. She wanted to be happy and to be whole and to not have any more skeletons in her closet. That way she could stop him when he would just be so full of all the crap that was her past, that he would want to run the opposite way.

Suddenly, Meredith found herself down on all four, kneeling at the toilet bowl. It was as if her body all on its own had decided to react to the very idea of Derek leaving her. Only the thought of having to go out in the hall and ask for cleaning equipment or letting the nurses come in and see her sick made her still her convulsions and prevent herself from throwing up the tequila she earlier had threw down. Meredith knew she was over analyzing and maybe drawing parallel lines where there was no need for any. Just because she and her mother shared the same name, the same profession and the same workplace and both had been members of the dirty mistresses' club didn't have to mean their ways would go along the same road. Yet she couldn't shake the feeling that all her fears had some core of truth to them. She rose from the floor, grabbed a paper towel from the bail and angrily wiped off the traces of tears from her face, silently cursing herself for being weak and pathetic. The bitterness slowly subsided as she swayed and staggered out to the bed, though. A thick cloud of exhaustion descended and covered her body but she knew she couldn't sleep now. She needed to get out of here before she did something really stupid, or got the nurses' attention, or got herself into a state where she no longer would manage to drive home. But no matter how wrinkled the sheet were or how boring the white linen looked, no bed had ever felt so inviting, so almost calling for her.

Despite knowing better, she let herself collapse against the pillows and promised herself that she would only lie down for a little while. The sound of the rain was louder now and had made its way into the bedroom as well, making Meredith's eyelids growing heavier but she was determined not to close them. She tried to focus on something that would keep her alert, but there was not a single one of the way too many thoughts whirling around in her head that she wanted to acknowledge. She had to try to think of something else. Something happy. Like how she and Derek used to lie in bed together. Derek would slip his arms around her, comfort her with all his warmth and protect her from all bad that might come up in the middle of the night. He really tried to be her knight in shiny... whatever. She blinked a couple of times, fighting to keep her eyes open. Derek wasn't here so apart from all the obvious reasons, it really would be a bad thing to fall asleep, given all the ghosts this night would be able to produce. She was warm now, not shivering like before, but unfortunately that made way for heavy eyelids and languor. She really couldn't bother with the effort of staying awake anymore. The energy she had to use to keep her eyes open way outdid the one she saved when they were closed.

Just a little nap. That was all she needed. Then she would be up and fit for facing reality again.


	3. Whatever Gets You Through Today

_A/N – So, my third chapter. Finally. Just as last time, I thought this would be a short chapter. Kind of like a filler between the last and the next. But just after two scenes, the story had expanded enourmously. I even had to cut it at the end and save some things for next chapter as I got some new ideas to work into the story. Despite the ridiculously long time since last chapter, this wasn't that hard to write. It was tedious to edit, though, and now I have no patience to do it anymore. I hope there are no errors, but I'll always be glad for a PM if you find one. _

_As usual, thanks to everybody that reviewed - it's so motivating! I recently found out that you can reply to reviews (!) so from now on, I'll try to do that! The chapter begins a couple of hours after the end scene in my last chapter. I hope you'll enjoy it. _

_-----_

Meredith staggered the last steps and heaved the box on the doorstep, gasping for air. It was the last one. She turned around to make sure she'd locked the car and confirmed that the red alarm was sparkling in the dark. The four boxes towered before her and she hurried to put the key in the door to escape the torrential rain. Not that she didn't plan not to change into sweats pants anyway, but the longer she stood here, the more her jeans would glue to her thighs and her hair transform into this water-dripping cloth that could create a little pool entirely on its own on her bathroom floor if she soaked it. She felt no desire whatsoever to tilt her head and catch some raindrops and felt a sudden sympathy towards those that used to say that sure, they liked rain. If they were inside. Entering the hall, she discerned Alex and Izzie in the living room, both with their back to her. One part of her hoped that neither of them would notice her sneak in, but another part of her was too tired to care at all. She guessed that the dragging of boxes over the floor would probably tell on her anyway, so she didn't even make a decent effort of being quiet.

"Meredith?" She heard Izzie's feet on the floor; the mere second it took for her to appear in the hall witnessed of her jump out of the couch and unceremoniously throw of the magazine she'd been reading on the table. "Is that you?"

"Hi, Iz," Meredith answered wearily, trying to look as if she knew what she was doing instead of merely pushing a couple of boxes over the floor with no purpose. She couldn't have been that successful, going by how Izzie was frowning and eyeing her up and down.

"What are you doing? And why are you looking like a drowned rat?" She put her hands in her side, her gaze changing from slightly apprehensive to reproachful. "You know Shepherd's been here asking for you?"

Meredith only mumbled something in response, trying as hard as she could to pull thoughts of Derek out of her mind for the moment and struggled out of her coat. She let it slip to the floor, not bothering to pick it up even if she saw the look Izzie shot her. As she continued to haul the heaviest box towards the stairs, Izzie followed her, reaching for her coat and hanged it neatly onto a hook in the process.

"Actually, I'm a bit mad at you. You left me alone with Alex tonight and you know I feel awkward around him. I thought we at least could hang out all of us, now that he's apparently is invited here permanently." Izzie cast a glance backwards into the living room, where Alex still lay on the couch, seemingly interested in a Seahawks game. "It's not like we've been sitting and painting each others toenails the whole evening." She giggled. "Well, I guess we wouldn't have no matter what conditions."

Meredith listened with only a half ear to Izzie's ramblings without being able to evoke even the slightest interest. Izzie seemed to finally catch her silence and palpable weariness and her voice softened as she remained standing only a few steps from her friend.

"Meredith, are you okay?" she asked uncertainly, managing not to fire twenty more questions. Meredith turned around to face her, to her disgust feeling tears in her eyes again. She swallowed and looked at Izzie. Even if she probably could fool her with a quick response and a hasty retreat to her room, she found that she couldn't slip the magic words. What she was supposed to have learned today kept popping up in her head. It was okay to share. She should share. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to start practicing already. She tried to smile but she knew it came out bleakly and she fumbled behind her before she found the last step of the staircase and sat down, her body too aching to carry her anymore.

"I've... I've been picking up my mother's things. It's all in here." Her words had been voiceless but she couldn't stop them from breaking ever so little before she stopped talking. Izzie stared at her for a second. Surely she was bursting with curiosity, but she didn't express even an ounce of it. She simply took the few steps separating them and sat down at Meredith's side. She put her arm around her and squeezed her in a kind of hug. It was brief, but strangely comforting and Meredith tried to blink away her tears. She didn't even think she was upset anymore; she was just so immensely tired that every little thing seemed to unbalance her.

She felt comfort in the silence that lingered between them as she let go of the stiffness that had held a tight grip of her the whole evening and rested her head against Izzie's shoulder. To her surprise, she was the one to speak first.

"I thought it would be hard," she said quietly. "Clearing it out... it would make it all too real." She felt Izzie's cheek move against her hair as she nodded; it made her own body to rock a little back and forth and she closed her eyes. "Nothing was easy, you know. And it's too late to change anything." She draw a breath, but it was neither too heavy nor too shallow as so many times this night, and she continued with an almost thoughtful voice. "So... hard, yeah. I didn't know it would be like this though."

Before Izzie could say anything, the murmuring background sound from the TV quieted and Alex appeared in the doorway, frowning at them where they sat and at the boxes, by now spread over the whole hallway.

"What's going on?"

Meredith opened her eyes and made an effort to disconnect from her trance and focus on him. With difficulty, she managed a small smile that she knew didn't reach her eyes and rose, her head already missing the warm comfort of Izzie's shoulder.

"It's nothing," she said. "I'm just terribly tired and really need some sleep. I'm just gonna drag those boxes into the den." She tried to blink away the exhaustion that lay as a thick layer draped over her body and took a hesitant step towards the nearest box.

Alex looked around the hallway as if he tried to grasp the situation, then shrugged. "I'll help you," he said. "They look pretty heavy."

"You don't need to," Meredith said as she bent down for the first box, but was resolutely sidestepped by Alex, who grabbed it as if it was nothing and made his way towards the little room. Meredith glared at him with all the irritation she could muster. "You don't have..."

"You're tired and you're tiny and I'm out here anyway," Alex broke her off and disappeared without waiting for her to reply. Meredith rolled her eyes and looked at Izzie for support, but she merely nodded.

"He's right and you know it. Just let him help you." She hesitated. "I know you're tired, but as I said before, Shepherd's been here asking for you. He hasn't called you? You might want to give him a call anyway. I think he was kind of worried about not knowing where you were."

Meredith just shook her head and didn't bother to come up with what thing would be the best to do. "Tomorrow," she said. "I'll talk to him tomorrow." And with that, she lifted a second box and followed Alex. She was lucky it was a lighter one, because she almost staggered under its weight and she knew she'd been perfectly fine carrying it before. She could feel Izzie's eyes on her back as she climbed the stairs after having unceremoniously dumped the box just inside the door of the den and went straight into the bathroom.

Like before, she avoided looking at herself in the mirror and quickly brushed her teeth and wiped off what little remained of her makeup. When she entered her bedroom, she felt a slightly guilty gratefulness towards Alex. She could have handled it. She shouldn't have burdened him. She promised herself to make it up to him somehow, but right now she was too unfocused to do pretty much more than going straight to bed. She fished her phone up from her pocket, wormed out of her jeans and threw her sweater on the floor. A faded blue t-shirt that was Derek's would have to do for the night; it was what lay nearest. Crawling under the cool sheets, she thrust her bare feet in the mattress, trying to get rid of the icy coldness between her toes. She reached for her phone to switch it off; going by Izzie's tone, chances were that Derek would call and she knew she wouldn't be able to handle it. Plus, she really needed her sleep right now. The short restless slumber she'd fallen into at her mother's bed hadn't really served any purpose at all except maybe making her even more tired. She had no clear memory of how she'd gotten out of the room and even less home in the car. She had a vague memory of a nurse having said something about driving carefully, but she was sure she hadn't bothered to as soon as the autopilot had kicked in.

As soon as she touched her phone, her screen lit up and announced five missed calls and three new messages. She knew from who without needing to check and the sight of Derek's name flashing across the tiny screen brought a metallic taste in her mouth. She hastily pushed the power button and threw the phone unnecessarily violently at the nightstand. Then she turned and curled up like a kitten beneath her sheets. She shut her eyes closed and tried not to think about the reason she'd been distracted to the extent that she could miss all those calls.

Behind her closed eyes was not the calm, painless darkness that she very much had hoped for. A clutter of feelings lay splashed on her retina like daubs of colors on an easel. It seemed like a spitting metaphorical image of her life. She was always the messy one. Never could her road seem to follow that straight line against a specific destination. Like Cristina's, for example. It was rather in a zigzag, like the seams in old sewing machines. Again and again, she was at the far end of that zigzag curve; unable to settle with the simple and uncomplicated.

Her mother hadn't made it easier for her. At the age of 18, she had once again since the whole pink hair phase tried to make her approve of her and expressed a wish to go to medical school, hoping to impress her with her ambitions. Her mother had just looked at her and dismissed her by saying there was no way she had what it took to be a surgeon. That she'd never make it. Although she would never have showed her mother how deep that had hurt her, she knew that comment had been responsible for most of her excessive partying during college. Which by no means had given her any clue to what she would do with the rest of her life. And, ironically, in her desperation to get Meredith away from her crazy post-college partying and lack of ambition, what had her mother suggested, but not medical school? Not that it had made her do it. No, it had to take her mother to get really sick for her to finally get her to decide anything at all. So, yeah, messy.

She shifted sides in the bed and wrapped the blankets tight around her. Those thoughts weren't new to her, rather, they were so well-known that if felt like coming home returning to them. But while the young Meredith had coped by stomping loudly around the edges to avoid dealing with the hard and cold inside, her present self tripped cautiously, careful not to stir up any old wounds. Muddling through life didn't need to be further complicated by making up with the past.

Trying to shut her eyes even more closed didn't seem to make those colors go away, so Meredith forced herself to relax and focused on taking even breaths. Emptying her mind did seem pretty impossible at this point and she didn't bother trying. She let her thoughts fly and only tried her best not to catch any of them, no matter how close they came to that place in her brain that seemed to feed her with darkness. Now that she was totally allowed to sleep; when she really needed to, it wasn't as easy as she had wanted. Annoyed, she flipped her pillow and tried to enjoy the coolness against her left cheek.

She could hear Alex and Izzie moving around the house, supposedly getting ready for bed. The light was lit in the hallway outside her room that she hadn't noticed being dark and quiet until now and she thought she could hear footsteps in the stairs and maybe a door opening and closing down in the hall, but she wasn't sure. And in that very moment, as she so well needed, she fell asleep.

She didn't notice how her own door opened and the light shone in on her sleeping figure. She didn't see Derek looking at her with that mix of concern and gentleness she was so used to by now. She didn't catch him quickly undressing, arranging her haphazardly thrown clothes on the same chair that he hung his own. She certainly wasn't aware of how he got into his side of the bed and gently covered her with the blankets she somehow had managed to kick to the footboard. Still, she instinctively moved closer when he lightly stroke her bare arms and let his lips touch her hair before positioning himself just behind her. Slipping his arms around her waist, he smiled slightly at this unconscious sign of trust and promised to keep her safe from whatever could be haunting her tonight.

-----

Derek woke up first in the morning, just in that second between the alarm's little snap and its actual signal, and he quickly reached to quiet it. He looked at Meredith where she lay next to him. She seemed to lie in the exact position as she had when he had curled up to her less than six hours ago, but he knew that she hadn't been motionless all night. He had woken several times by her anxious movements and muffled moanings, and his half-awake strokes had only served to calm her down for a short time. He hesitated. He knew he needed to wake her up to not make her late for work, but it was hard to scatter the sight of her laying there, for once peaceful and relaxed. He knew that once she woke up, she would frown, and question him, and shy away.

He didn't have had to bother. Meredith stirred a little and suddenly stifled a lazy yawn before opening her eyes. Her gaze was unfocused and she let her eyes travel around the room before really taking anything in. Derek's satisfaction with her sleepy peacefulness quickly turned into worry when her face no longer was obscured by her long eyelashes or her stray strands draped over her cheeks. Her paleness was so palpable that he thought he could take on it if he tried. Dark shadows that more resembled bruises played under her eyes. Not wanting to consider any other possibility for this shell of his girlfriend, Derek raised his hand, wanting to stroke her face and cling on to the belief that she had just caught the flu, or a bad cold.

His hand become uncertainly stuck in the air as Meredith's focus suddenly became clear. She smiled tiredly at him before frowning hesitantly as she racketed her brain to remember.

"What are you doing here?" Her voice was hoarse and she weakly tried to clear her throat a couple of times before giving up. "I thought..." She broke off, and her eyes glimmered suspiciously. "You're hovering again," she stated.

"I'm not," Derek answered. "But Meredith, you look like..." He trailed off, not wanting to make her miserable. Still confused over his presence, Meredith was about to make a snappy retort, but as memories from yesterday grew clearer she bit her tongue. Maybe she wasn't ready to spill... okay, share, yet, but she could refrain from snapping at him and making it worse. Besides, she didn't doubt that she looked what he had been kind enough to not articulate. Her head throbbed and the prospect of going up felt far from inviting. She closed her eyes again, wanting to drift back to sleep and make yesterday blur away.

"How do you feel, Mer?" Derek asked hesitantly. "Sick?" he quickly continued as he felt her stiffen and on the verge of any of her usual short answers she always seemed to have ready whenever he entered the invisible line of her private sphere. His voice had a slightly hopeful pitch to it; revealing his desire that her ashen complexion was something that could easily be fixed with some rest and hot tea.

Meredith's voice was a little muffled from being pressed against the pillow and she lay perfectly still, but even without visual clues, Derek thought he could make out a quiet no and he felt the by now well-known dread welling up inside him.

"Okay," he answered, unsure of what to say next. He wanted to push her, but he didn't want to push her. He wanted to blow life into the pale and motionless figure that lay next to him, reminding him a little too much for his taste of another time when she had lay lifeless in a bed. If only she could give him something to work with. He could fix it. He hadn't been able to last time, but now was different.

"Did something happen yesterday?" he tried. The lack of response gave him his answer and he felt a clinch to his gut that had nothing to do with the fact that she lay next to him with only a shirt, radiating that scent that was only her own. That was a thought he much rather would have held on to, but it wasn't hard let it go when those dark shadows kept obscuring his mind. "Do you want to talk about it?"

More silence. He took it as a no. He didn't know what he was supposed to do. He knew exactly what she wanted; for him to drop it and leave her alone. Part of him wanted to show her that respect, to accept her wishes not to talk about it. The other part of him knew that wouldn't do any of them any good. He wouldn't be able to help her, wouldn't be able to make up for what he so badly had messed up the last time.

"Meredith..." He waited for some acknowledgment and continued when she moved a little under the sheets. "I want to help you. Why won't you tell me what's wrong?"

The sheets rustled when she shook them off as she finally turned to face him. Her gaze was slightly dazed but she glared at him all the same. "What makes you think I need help?"

Derek studied her gravely. "When you won't even tell me what happened. It means it's something bad. It means you're upset. I want to be there for you when those things happen, Mer. Why won't you let me?"

She dropped her gaze down to the sheet, starting to fiddle with some thread only visible for her eyes. She bit her lip, looking for some way out. Derek thought that he could see her inner turmoil and sighed inwardly, barely able to keeping his growing frustration to himself.

"I..." Meredith began hesitantly, but fell silent once again before finishing her sentence.

"I called you... I don't know how many times," Derek said, unable to stop himself. "And I left messages. I even came over." He regretted his words as soon as he'd said them, knowing that she'd been on the verge of letting him in on some little bit of yesterday.

"Surely you know how to survive one evening without my company?" she asked. Derek frowned at how sour her words sounded and didn't know if he should interpret the look in Meredith's eyes as guilt or regret, or as anything at all.

"It's not about that and you know it." He sighed, loudly this time. The moment was over. He might as well say what he had in mind. "You're free to do whatever you want on your own. I'm just asking for... maybe some heads-up that we're not spending the night together, or heading home together, like we've been doing for quite a while now." He swallowed. "For all I knew you could have lain dead in a ditch somewhere." Or in a lake. His voice broke a little and he actively pushed his immediate associations back in his mind.

Meredith looked at him. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. She seemed to battle with herself for a second, then shrugged. "I was having a bad day. But Derek, I'm so tired. Now is not a good time to talk. Okay?"

He studied her carefully, trying to see if she'd said it just to avoid a conversation or if she actually meant it. She had closed her eyes and was lying down again, and his worries took over his frustration. Avoidance or not, she really did look exhausted, and the day hadn't begun. He had to let her off the hook.

"Mer, for the record, I want to be there for you – with you – on your bad days. Please, don't leave me out when you're down." He stroked her hair as he spoke, but she didn't answer and looking past her, he caught sight of the alarm. It was way past what it should, and he momentarily let their discussion go. "We really need to get going. I'm gonna take a shower. You should get ready."

At that at least, Meredith opened her eyes. She nodded slightly and raised on her elbows. "I'm coming," she mumbled. Derek shook off his sheets and placed a quick kiss on her cheek as he rose and disappeared into the bathroom. He had hardly closed the door behind him before she fell back against the pillows. She knew she had no time for this, but it was like she had no impact on her limbs. No matter how much she tried to tell them to lift and stand, sleep seemed to win and drag her deep down. Her eyes flicked only a couple of times before they were totally closed and she floated away in a dark slumber, quieter than any of the others she had attempted at earlier in the morning.

"Meredith!" Derek saw her jump at the sudden call of her name, blinking profusely to get a grasp of what was going on. He looked reproachfully at her, standing by her bedside only in boxers and with wet hair. "You were supposed to be ready. We're gonna be ridiculously late by now." He stepped closer and couldn't help a worried frown from appearing in his face. "Maybe you should call in sick today," he suggested. "Nobody that saw you would protest. I don't think you got much sleep tonight either."

Meredith sighed and made a huge effort to stand up. She wobbled a little, but regained her posture almost at once. "I'm fine, Derek. And I'm an intern. I don't do sick." He wanted to object, but she cut him off. "Do we really have time for arguing? I'm down in a couple of minutes, go ahead."

Still dressed only in Derek's shirt, Meredith stumbled out in the bathroom. The air was thick with hot fog still lingering from Derek's shower and she breathed it in, thankful for anything that would make her body shiver a little less. She went straight for the bathroom locker, resisting the desire to just sit down at the tub edge and close her eyes again. She rummaged the shelves for her Ibuprofen, muttering under her breath as she didn't find them at once. Someone seemed to have moved them. She knew that they had been on the middle shelf as recently as three days ago, when she'd needed some for her cramps. Looking up, she caught a glimpse of the small box on the top of the locker. She had to make a little jump to reach it, which her head certainly didn't appreciate. She shook two pills out in her hand and swallowed them without bothering with water.

She knew she had no time for a shower, so she reached for her hairbrush. Her movements were slow and lacked her usual competence as she drowsily dragged the brush through her hair. She had never bothered with Cosmo tips of at least 100 brushstrokes every morning, but as tiresome as it was lifting the brush repeatedly, the idea of just standing there and doing nothing else seemed pretty tempting. She sighed when her right arm started to protest and put her hair up in a simple ponytail with an elastic. No shower equaled no loose waves. Out of habit more than actively wanting to look in it, she wiped the fog from the mirror over the sink. The face that met her almost made her gasp and she had no problem understanding Derek's concern. Still, she couldn't appreciate it. She wanted so badly to function normally and he made it so hard. What could she do to make him understand? The fact that she actually knew the answer to that question didn't really make her feel better. _Give him something. Anything. He wants to help you. _She bit her lip and tried to shut her inner voice out. But she knew it was right. Derek wanted so badly for her to let him in so that he could help her. God knows what he thought she needed help for, or what he actually could do, but there he was. Derek the savior. Derek the knight in shining... whatever. That was who he was. And not letting him be that guy... it hurt him. She knew it did. Maybe she could give him something, just a little piece, to still him. It might give her some space from the constant concern that right now was threatening to destroy something of the precious relationship they'd slowly built again.

Almost going crazy over the constant debate inside her head and her inability to decide anything at all at the matter, she focused again on her face in the mirror. She suddenly wished she had a concealer hidden somewhere in her locker, but the only makeup she ever wore was a little mascara and occasionally some lipgloss. Izzie probably owned an army of concealers, but Meredith had no energy to make the long trip to Izzie's room and back, especially undressed like this. She had to do without. Maybe the shadows would disappear during the day, especially with the magic of a coffee or ten.

She settled on just splashing her face with a lot of cold water and to her surprise, she found that it helped a little bit with the dim tiredness she currently felt herself wrapped up in. Avoiding a second glance in the mirror, she turned to return to the bedroom to find something to put on. A light knock on the door made her remain standing, unsure if she should answer or not.

"Dr. Shepherd? Meredith? Are you okay in there? Um... I don't want to bother you, but I was getting ready to go and I was just wondering if you wanted a ride or..." Even though it probably was intent on being quiet, she could hear Izzie's whisper pretty clearly. She hesitated, not knowing if Derek still was in the room or not. But then she heard his mumblings through the door.

"We're okay, Izzie. But we're probably gonna be a little late. We're taking our car, you go ahead." Meredith heard Izzie's muffled steps down the stairs, and some moments later, Derek's heavier ones. Entering the bedroom now that it was empty, she searched the floor for yesterday's clothes, but noticed they were neatly draped on the back of her chair. Derek must have done that. She almost smiled inwardly at him taking the time for something so insignificant. She wouldn't have picked him for an even so slight OCD disorder. She reached for her shirt, but swore quietly when she discovered the stains on the middle of it. When had that happened? Disgusted, she threw it away, not caring the slightest where it landed.

Her closet was messy, she stated when she opened the doors to find something else. And empty. When had that happened? She rummaged through sweatpants, hoodies and unused dresses without finding one single pair of jeans or regular shirts. Where were they? There must be a reason her closet was only a quarter of its original size. She closed her eyes and forced herself to think. Damn. It was her laundry week. She was supposed to gather everybody's dirt and clean it. And she hadn't delivered. She hadn't even looked at the laundry basket all week. It must be totally overspilled. If not... Izzie could have saved her ass this week. It wasn't entirely impossible. Maybe the laundry room would shine with new, washed clothes, neatly hanged and tumble-dried and all ready to wear. Either way, she would have to head down there to find something. She sighed, but grabbed her phone and purse and looked around the room to check that she hadn't missed anything. The bed was made. As late as they were running, Derek had still cared to do that. She shook her head slightly at his priorities before she closed the door and thundered down the stairs.

Izzie hadn't performed any miracles. The laundry basket was overfull, mainly with her own clothes, and she made a mental note to really get it done when her shift ended tonight. She grabbed a blue shirt on top of the pile and eyed it suspiciously. No visible stains, at least. She sniffed it. Maybe a faint scent of sweat, but it would have to do. The pair of black jeans that stuck out from under a mismash of socks and underwear too.

She thought she could hear a quiet conversation from the kitchen as she approached, but she wasn't sure, and as soon as she stepped in, nobody talked. Izzie stood at the counter with her coat already on and hovered uncertainly. She scrutinized Meredith and tried to catch her eye. Meredith could see her unspoken questions, but she had no energy for secret body language codes and merely nodded and put on a small smile. Izzie frowned, but cleared her throat.

"I made some breakfast if you're hungry. You're running really late, so you could bring it in a napkin and eat in the car or something." She gestured at the plate with pancakes, accompanied with the mandatory maple syrup. "There's coffee, too," she added and for the first time that morning, Meredith's face broke in a genuine smile. Coffee. That was what she needed.

She grabbed the black mug with Seattle Grace's logo that at some point had been brought home and never returned and filled it with the steaming beverage. It smelled of promises of a good morning and at least a slightly less miserable day. She cast a glance at Derek sitting at the table. His plate was already wearing traces of syrup, and he wiped off his chin with a napkin as she sank down on the chair next to his.

"Um, so.. I'm gonna go," Izzie said. "Alex is waiting for me in the car. Take your time, Mer. I'll cover for you." She made a pause. "About tonight..."

"I'm almost done," Meredith broke off, not paying attention to Izzie's last words, but she had nothing for her effort. Izzie exchanged a look with Derek, who gave her an approving nod and tilted his head against the door. Izzie threw Meredith a last, concerned gaze before disappearing, her bag bobbing against her hip. Meredith frowned at Derek while she stood up and began rummaging the kitchen drawers for a travel mug.

"What was that about? I'm ready to go. I'll just bring my coffee instead of burning my tongue."

"Take your time, Mer." Derek stretched his legs under the table as he repeated Izzie's words. "You need to eat to get through the day."

"I can't eat," Meredith stated. "I'm sorry Derek, but I'm really not up for pancakes right now, and I'm sure my day will be crappy enough anyway without having Bailey bailing out on me for being late." For the second time this morning, Derek looked like he wanted to object, but she continued. _Give him something. Anything._ "You should have let me get a ride with Izzie if you wanted to take it slow. I'd rather go right away. Are you ready?"

Derek sighed, his expressions suspiciously like a sad puppy, but he refrained from coaxing her further, scraped off his plate and followed her out in the hallway.

-----

Meredith slipped out through the locker room door as she struggled with her lab coat, peeling desperately around for a sight of her resident. Unlike her mother, who never had hesitated to tell her whose fault it was she didn't get to work in time, she had only herself to blame for being late. She'd missed rounds. By the time she and Derek had arrived at the hospital, it had been no use for her to try catching up with the other interns, not even if she had skipped changing into scrubs. Which meant she needed to find Bailey as soon as possible to get an assignment. Finding Izzie to align their cover stories would also be helpful.

She took right at the elevators, thinking that Bailey might be by the end of the patients' rooms, bossing somebody or other around. She wasn't. Neither was she by any coffee cart Meredith knew about. Or getting labs. She sighed and checked her pager for at least the third time. Still quiet. And she hadn't even glimpsed a sight of anyone she knew by now. She turned and began making her way over to the nurses' station. Nurses were gossipy people. They had an amazing ability to keep track of everyone's business.

It wasn't exactly still and quiet at the floor's center point. Orderlies run past with patients in wheelchairs, eager medical students with notepads and shiny name tags tossed around; doctors stopped by to confirm prescriptions or ask for charts and all kinds of nurses did their best to serve everyone. Meredith saw George stand at the far part of the counter, seemingly going over a chart together with a short, chubby nurse. He nodded as she pointed to something in the papers and absentmindedly scratched his hair with a pencil.

"George!" Meredith hissed loudly enough for it to be audible to him at that distance. She motioned for him to come over as he looked up. Excusing himself, he shut the chart, placed it under his arm and went over to where she was leaning against the desk.

"Tired, huh?" he said gently. Meredith arched her brows before remembering her mirror image from this morning, and then, the cloud of exhaustion that still lingered but that she'd managed to put in the background.

"I guess a little." _How do you feel, Mer? _She shrugged, not letting George dwell on the subject. "I need to find Bailey. Do you have any clue where she is?"

"Well," George answered. "Rounds are over. She might be in the gallery. She and Izzie are gonna scrub in for Burke later but I don't think they're prepping their patient yet."

Gallery. Meredith wondered why she hadn't thought of that herself, but clipping with her eyes to fight the fatigue from merely standing up, she remembered why. She mouthed a thank you at George and headed for the galleries. It seemed like a long way. She considered getting some coffee on the way, but thought better of it and instead quickened her pace. So Izzie would be with Bailey. That gave her a pretty slim chance of talking to her beforehand. She had to improvise and hope Izzie would somehow lead the conversation.

The galleries to OR 1 and 2 were empty. Looking through the glass window into OR 3, Meredith saw Izzie's blond ponytail whipping up and down as she gestured, perhaps asking their resident about something happening down at the table. She tried to read Bailey's back to determine her mood, but the only she could see was nodding and gesturing back and she couldn't make anything out of that. She swallowed, then opened the door and poked in her head.

"Um... hi," she said somewhat hesitantly. She hoped none of the women would comment on her tired looks as they turned around. Izzie flashed her a quick smile and nodded eagerly as Meredith raised her eyebrows at her in a silent question.

"Hi, Mer," she said breathlessly. "So there you are. I told Bailey about your alarm clock. Wouldn't hurt to have an extra, right?"

Meredith stared at her. She'd told Bailey that the alarm hadn't shrilled? It was really lame, and she could tell from her look at Izzie that Bailey didn't really believe in that. She didn't push it though, but frowned at Meredith.

"Are you all right?" she asked briskly.

"Yep," Meredith replied. _Did something happen yesterday?_

"You missed rounds."

"I know. I'm on pit again, aren't I? I'll be heading down at once," Meredith hurried to say, careful not to sound disappointed by her assignment. But Bailey surprised her by shooking her head.

"You're not on pit. Sloane's requested you." She looked a little reproachful at this, but shooed Meredith towards the door when she remained standing, her face a picture of bemusement. "Don't waste anymore time than you already have, Grey, and go find him."

Meredith blinked, but obeyed and stepped out of the gallery, a frown still on her face. How had Mark managed to request her already? He wouldn't even know that she was in. He was bound to choose one of the other interns, the one most eager and clever when rounding on the patient. She didn't know what to make of it, so she guessed the best she could do was wandering the halls to track him down. She just wished the corridors hadn't been so long in this place. Her legs were already aching with the effort of just not sitting down.

She found him in a small office down the hallway near the nurses' station. He was sitting in front of the computer, but was not looking at the screen. He flipped through a thick chart, humming to himself whenever he found something worth scribbling down in the margins. Meredith lingered in the doorway more than two minutes, not wanting to disturb him, before he looked up and caught sight of her.

"I figured I'd save you from the pit today," he greeted without further ado, twinkling at her. Meredith nodded slowly, still not grasping what lay behind this sudden thoughtfulness. Both being members of the dirty mistresses club, she and Mark were allies in a way Derek would never understand. Still, even with that in mind, she'd never expected him to step up like this for her. Her eyes narrowed, but before she had a chance to speak, another voice cut through the air.

"Mark." Derek sounded tense as he walked towards them. "Hey," he continued as he leaned in to Meredith and kissed her cheek. She looked at him and sighed, but smiled nonetheless. Apparently, he was trying to smooth things between them since their silent ride to the hospital. "I thought we were gonna meet at the nurses' station," Derek said as he turned to Mark again. "But apparently you and Dr. Grey are busy with a cosy little gathering."

"Actually, I was on my way. Just wanted to read up on a few things first," Mark replied. "Dr. Grey just got here. Shall we, then?"

Derek frowned and looked at Meredith. "Did you need anything? Are you on your way to the pit?"

Meredith looked from Derek to Mark, not sure of where this was going. She had thought she would working with Mark, but maybe she had misunderstood something. She wouldn't call her judgment sharp and alert for the moment and Derek obviously seemed to suppose something else entirely. "I... um," she began uncertainly, but Mark stepped in.

"I asked Dr. Grey to assist today," he said calmly. "I'm sure she'll learn a lot and it's been a while since I had her on plastics."

Derek's expression darkened visibly. "She just had time off after a... " He hesitated and searched for the right word. "A real trauma," he decided at last. "She doesn't need a lot of pressure in the O.R. this soon."

Mark arched his brows. "Are you back at work, Dr. Grey?" he asked politely.

Meredith cast an annoyed glance at Derek. They had driven to work in silence; she in the passenger seat with her eyes shut and her hands on the travel mug in her knee to warm up a little and he with his jaw clenched that way he thought it wasn't visible and his eyes very focused on the red lights. _Do you wanna talk about it?_ But no matter their private relation, he had no right telling her what was best for her at work like this.

"Or should I take it you're not interested in scrubbing in on a cranial vault reconstruction later?" Mark interrupted her thoughts, the corner of his mouth twitching a little.

Meredith gasped. "Are you serious?" These reconstructions were made on children with craniosynostosis and those cases were pretty rare. She had never seen one done before. Mark grinned at her.

"Meredith..." Derek interrupted. His eyes were dark, concern mixed with poorly hidden anger and frustration. She thought she could see some sadness there too. "Are you sure you're ready for this? You don't have to do it."

"I'm fine, Derek," she bit at him, irritation building up in her. She regretted it a little when she saw his face. _Why won't you tell me what's wrong?_ She didn't want to argue with him. Wasn't she the one to steer them away from uncomfortable subjects just this morning? "Besides, plastics _and_ neuro? Any day about a million times more exciting than the pit," she tried to ease the tension.

"I thought so," Mark said, seemingly oblivious to Derek's stares. "Will you prep the patient? Andrew Hudson in 2212."

"Sure," Meredith said breathlessly. She took the chart he held out for her, pivoted on her heel and headed for the patients' rooms at the end of the hall, wanting to get as far away from the dispute that no doubt immediately would rise in the office.

When she stepped out of 2212 fifteen minutes later, her tiredness was a little less obvious. At least her feet were not shuffling along the floors. Prepping patients was sometimes a bit tedious and not at all as thrilling as the actual surgery, but she usually enjoyed talking to the patients. It was certainly better than running with bloodworks. And it forced her to push her own problems back in her mind for a while. She walked resolutely through the hallway. She was supposed to call and book time for Andrew to have his preoperative photos taken so that Derek and Mark could have his latest pictures during the surgery. Except checking his vitals and doing a blood workup, this was the only prepping she had to do. Since he was only nine months old, he had to be sedated for CT scans, so those had been taken yesterday to avoid putting him under anesthesia twice the same day. She cast quick glances into the rooms whose doors stood open as she went, and in one of the last ones, a glimpse of dark hair and a deep pink sweatshirt made her stop.

Julie Fowler sat cross-legged on her bed, her now loose bangs sweeping in her eyes and her focus on the television in the far corner. The pillbox and the water and the few other items that had been standing at the bedside yesterday were gone, and the sheets were neatly stretched around the bed edges like someone had been changing them recently. Meredith took a step into the room.

"Hi, Julie," she said gently. The girl turned around and her face split into a small grin.

"Hi, Dr. Grey." Her hospital gown was gone and she was dressed in the same clothes that she had come in yesterday. Which meant her mother hadn't been there with new clothes, Meredith realized. She took up Julie's chart that was clipped to the bed and scanned it quickly.

"You're ready to go home?" Meredith asked and smiled at Julie. "I can see that they're letting you out of here. How do you feel?"

"I still have a headache," Julie shrugged. "Watching T.V. isn't really helping either, I guess. But that's all I can do with my arm. And I'm still a little tired. But I'm better than yesterday."

Meredith nodded. "That's normal. You hit your head. It's understandable that it still hurts but it will vanish with time and rest. But your vitals have been stable during the night so everything looks just fine. You just enjoy a day or two at home before going back to school."

"Yeah," Julie said hesitantly. "Actually, I don't really like being alone home. I know it sounds really childish, but..." She trailed off, looking down at her lap. Meredith was quiet for a moment. Looking back, it sometimes surprised her that there actually had been a time where she had come home to a house neither pitch black or dead quiet. Those memories were associated with a home she didn't really remembered and a to family that later merely became a distant dream. She had worked hard at suppressing her childhood memories but she would always remember the darkness and the silence and the constant need to fight it.

"Your mother wasn't here visiting you yesterday, was she?" she asked at last. It wasn't really a question, and Julie just shook her head without looking up.

"She was busy at work. I mean, she has this really big client so she can't really afford taking time off whenever." Meredith couldn't really tell if she sounded defensive or if she just explained what she thought was obvious. "But she promised to pick me up today after lunch." Julie looked at Meredith. "I hope she didn't had to cancel some lunch meeting, though", she added in a small voice.

"Where does your mother work?" Meredith asked, trying to sound like this was a normal conversation and not one that scratched the surface of the part of her brain that hosted all her ugly memories.

"She's a lawyer," Julie answered. "She's an associate at her firm, so she has a lot of responsibility. She even takes on charity cases, which she says are the most demanding ones. So she really has a lot to do."

Meredith nodded. This was getting more and more like her own story and she didn't like it at all. She hesitated. She didn't want to get too personal with a patient, but remembering her twelve year old self, she thought Julie could need to hear that she wasn't so alone as she might thought.

"My mother worked a lot when I was a kid," she said quietly. "I was by myself a lot of the time. I know it can be scary." She wondered if she should say something more. Offer some advice. But Julie spoke first.

"Yeah. I figured," she said, looking straight at Meredith. Seeing Meredith's perplexed expression, she smiled a little. "I thought I could see it in your eyes. Or maybe it was that you didn't push it. It's like you see a kid on the schoolyard, and without knowing her, you just know she's a loner. I think it's something in the eyes."

Meredith blinked. She was stunned that Julie had read her so well. She wondered if it was her being really transparent, open like a book for everyone to read, or if it was Julie being really perceptive. She opened her mouth to ask, but before she could come up with something to say, her pager beeped.

"Crap," she said in a low voice. She checked her page. It was Derek. She wasn't sure if he wanted the status of the patient or another go at convincing her to take it easy, but either way she really needed to get going with Andrew's prepping. "Julie, I'm sorry," she said earnestly. "I must answer this." She put her hand on Julie's shoulder for a moment. "I try to check back on you later, but if you're already out of here then... take care. Okay?"

Julie's shoulder slouched a little, maybe disappointed that their talk must end so abruptly, but she nodded and managed to smile. Meredith looked at her, cursing that her pager had chosen this moment to go off and hated the fact that she had to leave Julie in the middle of their talk. But her pager beeped a second time, and she had no choice but get going.

Once outside Julie's room, she had to stand absolutely still for a moment to fight the wave of dizziness that towered above her. And to swallow a few of the sobs that desperatly clawed to get their way up her throat. Her mother wasn't dead. Despite the beautiful urn in the back of her closet, she still managed to jump out of a corner and scare the hell out of her. Somehow she still found her way into this hospital. Into old photos. Into her head. Meredith had thought that their meeting in the tunnel would have served as some kind of closure. That her mother's hug had somehow meant that everything was fine. No hard feelings. No bones to pick.

Apparently, she had been wrong.


	4. Tell Me What To Do

_A/N – Fourth chapter up! I had hoped to get this up a little sooner than this, but there you go. The editing took an eternity as usual. I guess I should learn. This chapter was supposed to be the next to last, but it seems like I have more to write, so I'm taking a guess at six chapters in total for this story. It may be more than that if the characters have different opinions than me during the writing. That happened in this chapter, for instance. They sort of took off without me so I just had to scribble down what they felt like saying. At least it makes an interesting process..._

_This chapter picks up immediately where chapter 3 ended, so you might want to cast a glance at it before reading if you don't remember it exactly. Read & enjoy! _

_-----_

Meredith took a deep breath when her pager beeped a third time and forced herself to snap out of her trance. She had no time for a breakdown right now. She had work to do. She had to be fine. Casting a quick glance at her pager, she clenched her jaw to make her body forget about the lack of sleep it had suffered lately and jogged through the corridor towards the office where she'd met with Mark before. She imagined Derek tapping his fingers impatiently while waiting for her and she quickened her pace even further. She saw him from a distance. He was sitting at the little desk, browsing some file on the computer. He wasn't tapping, but he looked absent; not at all into whatever he was trying to read. She contemplated for a moment what to say to him; she wasn't sure if she should wallow in her anger over his condescending behavior earlier, or if she should pretend everything was fine between them. She shrugged and decided to let it go. After all, she was the expert of being fine with all sorts of things.

"Hi," she said to make him aware of her presence. Since she was a little unsure of his reasons for paging her, she resisted the lust to ramble nervously and waited for him to respond.

"Hi," he replied when he looked up at her. "How's the prepping going?"

"It's fine," Meredith nodded. "I've just ordered Andrew's preoperative photos. They had a free spot right before lunch, so I'm taking him any minute. Otherwise he seems fine apart from hunger." She smiled a little. "It's not easy being nine months and not getting to eat whenever you feel like it."

"No," Derek said. "It's not." But he didn't return her smile, and she found that hers faded at the sight of his solemn expression. She could see that he'd missed a spot when he'd shaved this morning and it made him look shabby, if only ever so little. Usually she hated the way his stubble scraped against her face when they kissed but now she had to fight against the urge to lean in and kiss that rough slide of bristle. She didn't dare to.

"Derek?" she said at last. She weighed between asking him what was wrong and keeping the conversation professional to avoid any sensitive subject he might dwell on. "Did you want me to do anything else or should I go back to Andrew?" she decided at last. Being professional seemed safer.

Derek shook his head. "No, it's fine. I don't need anything." He hesitated. "But Meredith..." He looked at her, as to assess her mood before saying anything. She tried to keep a neutral face, even though she was pretty sure of what was coming. "You don't need to do this," he continued, just as she'd known. "It's only your second day back, and if you want to observe, if you want to take some time, not deal with any pressure... Mer, everyone will understand. It'll be okay."

She sighed. So there they went again. Why did it seem that no matter how many times she tried to tell him that she was fine and that she did want to work, to feel normal, he returned again, and again, and again? Why couldn't he just get that she was over whatever happened in that water and that she was trying to move on? She knew she was supposed to tell him a lot of things, she did, but his constant pushing somehow had the opposite effect. She was surprised at her own stubbornness but she simply wouldn't let him win this one. And then there was that whole knot in her stomach that kept telling her that he under no circumstances would stay if she did tell him. She closed her eyes. She had absolutely no energy to deal with this right now. There were enough ghosts and voices inside her head as it was at the moment.

"You're hovering again," she said tiredly, not looking at Derek. She couldn't take this dead end conversation for what felt like the millionth time over just a few days. She didn't think she could manage putting up a bright smile, fake or not, to protect herself from that sad puppy face Derek had been so good at lately. So she looked down at the floor.

"No." She looked up again at the sound of Derek's voice so forceful. She hadn't heard him like that since she died and she'd gotten so used to the quiet, concerned one that her heart did a little flip-flop. "No," Derek repeated. Meredith could see that even if sadness hadn't fully vanished, there was something else to his features. "I'm not hovering Meredith, and if I am, it's because I am concerned about you."

"Which is it, Derek?" Meredith asked sarcastically. "Are you hovering or not? Because your sentence makes no sense." She regretted her words immediately as she had said them and she saw the look on his face. Great, Meredith. Now you cavil. Very mature. But she found that she couldn't take them back; she couldn't even wash the stern look off her face like she actually wanted to.

Derek threw his arms in the air, seemingly at a loss for words. "I'm not... " And then his face got that closed, determined look again. "Forget it, Meredith. I try to help you. You know what I said to you as recent as this morning. I want to be there for you. I asked you to not close me out. But that's exactly what you're doing. You don't trust me. And I... I don't know if I can... " He hesitated. "If I can... " He shook his head, "Just forget I asked."

Meredith bit her lip when he saw his resigned face. It had lost all of its determination and she thought that they probably matched each other in exhaustion right now. "Derek, I... it's not that I don't trust you."

"It isn't?" he said tiredly and even before he questioned her, Meredith could tell that he knew it wasn't true. Because it really wasn't. "It doesn't matter that I've tried for almost a year to prove to you that you can trust me, you still don't, Meredith."

Meredith wanted to reply, but found herself having gone mute for the moment. Somehow, Derek's last statement didn't seem right. He hadn't tried to prove his trustworthiness for almost a year. In fact, you could say he'd spent the last year constantly trying to break her trust. First with the hidden wife. Then with the choosing of the wife. By calling her a whore. By walking away for the better guy.

"Maybe I don't trust you because you don't trust me." She was almost as surprised as Derek looked when the words were out. But she knew they were true. She took a deep breath. "You don't let me be strong on my own. I was perfectly fine on my own before I met you. I coped. I have always coped and I am not fragile as you seem to have got into your head."

"Perfectly fine?" Derek asked with raised eyebrows. "You were perfectly fine?" Meredith suspected that was meant to make her look down at her feet again, but something rose in her chest and she stared him straight into the eyes.

"Yes, Derek. I was fine. And I know I overuse that word, but sometimes I actually am fine, no matter what you try to imply. And you doubting me these times? Doesn't make it any better, Derek. Life may have handed me crappy cards, but trying to deal with them isn't exactly easier with you not trusting me being able to do it."

Derek shook his head and muttered something under his breath. Meredith thought it sounded suspiciously like something about a track record with not dealing at all, and that fed the little monster inside her chest even more. At first she didn't even care how his voice had taken a broken edge to it as he spoke again.

"You walk away, Meredith. You do it constantly. I'm walking on ice here. Don't you think I know you want me to keep my mouth and pretend I don't see your pain? Don't you think I know that if I push you one inch too much, you're gonna walk away?"

Meredith stared at Derek, his shattered tone now echoing in her head. Those were her feelings. Not his. She wasn't walking. But he would if she told him some of the things she'd been keeping to herself pretty much her whole life. And his ability to steer the conversation just to those things she wanted to avoid was absolutely stupendous. She knew he was looking at her, maybe not with his usual concerned gaze, but at least with some worry behind that veil of suppressed anger that still lingered. She tried to maintain whatever hold she still had on that strength she'd claimed just a couple of minutes ago, but going by his face, she wondered if she actually didn't look just as fragile as he obviously pictured her. She felt a wave of guilt wash over her and it made her face flush. She never intended to make him feel like this.

"Derek, I..." she began, oblivious to him having said her name a couple of times. She searched desperately in her memory for something to tell him, something that would make him feel a little included. She would have to figure out the rest later. But her mind was blank. She couldn't recall one single memory, neither good nor bad, and she started to panic. She saw Derek's expression soften and that made her if possible even more pressed.

"Meredith. I guess we're probably both at fault here," she heard him say, but she shook her head violently. This was all on her. She'd failed to communicate. Once again. She'd thought all there was to his behavior was a little streak of savior complex. How stupid could she get? She felt her chest contract and she recognized the shallow breaths from yesterday. She had to get out of here. She couldn't take his sympathy right now.

She turned around and started to make her way out of the office. She heard Derek follow her, but she quickened her pace until she was running blindly towards the nearest supply closet she knew about. Pressing herself down in the far corner between a shelf of supplies and a small bench, she felt the treacherous tears she'd managed to keep in until now fall down her cheeks. He was angry at her again. And she deserved it.

_-----_

Looking around the cafeteria, Meredith tried to catch a glimpse of any of her friends. After standing on her toes, knowing that she should feel ridiculous but being too tired to care, she finally saw Alex and Izzie sitting at a table near the back. She pushed her way over and sank down next to Izzie. She had been sitting in the supply closet for a good twenty minutes, somehow desperately wanting Derek's shoulder to rest on, yet anxiously watching the door in fear of him walking in. She had run round the bathroom to make sure she didn't look too red and blotched and hoped her face no longer bore evidence of her embarrassing, stupid tears. In an attempt to make her think about something that didn't have to do with Derek, her mother or the increasing number of failures in her life, she turned to Izzie.

"Hey, Iz, how does it feel being back in the game again?" She poked at the lettuce leaves of her green salad and pushed a shrunken tomato slice aside. She felt slightly stupid for not having asked Izzie earlier; after all, today was already her second day as a full worthy intern again, but yesterday hadn't really provided any spare room for thoughts of that. "Even Callie asked about you before," she added, suddenly remembering the hesitant question Callie had blurted just before she had left the room after Julie's exam yesterday. "I thought you two couldn't stand each other." As Izzie hadn't exactly been easy on Callie since her marriage to George, any concern from Callie's side was pretty unexpected and Meredith had been a little surprised.

Izzie looked up from her sandwich. "Callie asked about me?" she said cautiously. "What did she... I mean... did she... " She broke off, and Meredith followed her glance, seeing George standing in the middle of the cafeteria just like she had done a couple of minutes ago. Izzie opened her mouth, but before she had called him over, George lightened up and made his way to a table not so long from where they were sitting, taking his seat next to Callie. "Right. Just abandon your friends," Izzie mumbled and shot him an annoyed look. She looked back at Meredith, throwing her long hair back. "Umm... how's it going? Fine. It's going fine. Not rock star fine, but still... At least I get to talk to patients again."

"Fine? You'd better hope it's not Meredith fine," Alex chipped in.

Meredith frowned at him. "What's that supposed to mean?" Alex just shrugged and took a bite of his pizza slice. Before Meredith got an answer, Izzie bent forward over the table, looking at them.

"Seriously, he sees Callie all nights _and_ he's working with her. He can't even make it to lunch with us? Seriously?"

"I wouldn't say all nights, Izzie. He's on call, she's on call..." Meredith said. "Why do you care anyway? He's happy with her, that's good, right?"

"I'm his best friend and in my opinion he made a huge mistake," Izzie explained impatiently. "And while you and Cristina might live in your own little bubble, being fine..." She trailed off, scrutinizing Meredith. "Or not fine. How are you holding up?"

Meredith was on the verge of the magic words again, but remembering yesterday's conversation in the hallway, she merely shrugged and forced a small smile. Izzie shot her a concerned glance and looked like she wanted to say something, making Meredith quickly turn to Alex. "How's Jane Doe doing?"

"Yeah, she's hanging in there," Alex answered. "Pretty bruised and all, but Sloan's gonna fix her."

"But she's still Jane Doe? Nobody claimed her yet?"

Alex shook his head and took a gulp of water. "I guess it's not easy recognizing anybody so messed up, but once she's fixed we can put her picture out there."

Meredith sighed. "It can't be easy, being here all by yourself. But at least she's a grown-up. My patient's twelve and her mother didn't visit her yesterday and is barely making the effort of coming here to pick her up later." She chewed on a carrot stick. "The girl actually insisted on us not bothering her with a call when she came in."

"She might be working," Izzie suggested. "Not everyone can get off work instantly. I had a patient whose mother had to leave her alone here for a graveyard shift at a truck stop diner. It's not easy, but what're you supposed to do?" She shrugged, feeling Meredith's eyes on her. "I'm just saying, not everyone comes from upper middle class. That might be the reason."

Meredith gnawed thoughtfully on her third carrot stick, considering Izzie's perspective. While Julie had made it pretty clear to her that it indeed was about her mother's work, she somehow had a feeling it wasn't all about being able to pay this month's rent. Julie's small voice telling her she didn't like being alone home played in her mind and she wondered if she'd been picked up yet. She stirred as Cristina slid down in the seat next to her, rolling her eyes at the noodles at her plate.

"Okay, seriously, what is it with weddings that make people go crazy over every little detail? I mean, do I care how my hair is done or which color my flowers will have?" Cristina impatiently pulled up her black hair in a messy ponytail, emphasizing what she just said.

Meredith quirked an eyebrow. "Well, if you don't care, let Burke decide. What does he want anyway?"

"What does he want?" Cristina stared at her. "What does he not want, rather. He has opinions about everything – the dress, the flowers, the freaking cake, for gods sake. I mean, cream or raspberry, chocolate or frosting, I don't care. I probably won't eat it anyway for all those people he wants to invite will track me down the whole evening."

Meredith sighed. "I'm avoiding Derek. I mean, not avoiding, really. Just... not communicating."

"Yeah," Cristina said, taking a break from her not so silent cursing of everything connected with weddings, apparently coming to think of their broken off relationship sharing at Joe's the past night. "How did it go with dead mommy anyway?"

Meredith saw Izzie give them a sharp glance. "Um," she said. "That. Well, it was... She told me a lot of things. Gave me relationship advice, even."

"Huh. So I guess something happened to packing with closed eyes. Told you you would've needed me to take a first look." Cristina took a swig out of her water bottle.

"Um, right," Meredith replied faintly. "And now there's the avoiding of Derek. I mean the non-communication. And he just wants to talk. I don't get why he wants to know all my crap." She sighed, only to find three pairs of eyes staring at her. "What?"

Izzie shook her head, ignoring to state the obvious answer to Meredith's question. Having stopped glaring at George and Callie at the other table, she sat up a little straighter. "Now, about tonight... Everybody's still on, I hope?" Alex and Cristina mumbled in agreement but Meredith frowned.

"What's tonight?"

Izzie looked at her as if she was out of her mind for even asking such a question when she obviously should know the answer. "Study night. I was trying to remind you this morning. We've got intern exams coming up all too soon, if you've managed to forget that."

Meredith's eyes widened at the until now pretty much pushed away thought of taking her exam just in a couple of weeks' time. She definitely needed to study. But she was in no way up for a long night with her friends. Derek could help her study. If he would show up after today, that was. Or she could just roll up in her bed and pretend that going to bed at eight o'clock was the perfectly normal and sane thing to do. She was just about to tell her friends no when Izzie went on.

"Anyway, I was thinking... couldn't we make it a slumber party?" Izzie beamed expectantly at the others. Cristina stared at her, clearly trying to comprehend what was going on inside of her head and Alex had slightly raised an eyebrow. Once again, Meredith attempted to say that wasn't gonna happen, but Izzie wasn't finished. "I thought it could be a great thing, you know. All of us... the _five_ of us," she emphasized casting an annoyed glare in George's direction. "Quizzing each other, hanging out. I can cook!"

Meredith blinked at the enthusiasm that poured from Izzie. She wasn't sure if this was yet an attempt from her side to avoid being alone with Alex, or a way of getting George away from Callie, or if it was an actual sincere wish to slave in the kitchen. She looked at Cristina for support, but before she could say anything, Cristina flinched and glared exasperatedly at Izzie over the table.

"Ouch! What... " She broke off and Meredith was just able to catch the significant glance and the small tilt of Izzie's head. Cristina sighed loudly. "Fine. I can eat food. And quizzing could be fun. Although I'm gonna kick your pathetic little asses all the way down the exam hall."

"Yay," squealed Izzie and turned her attention to Alex.

"Whatever," he said after giving up on trying to decipher what she was aiming at with her intense gaze. "I'll be home studying anyway."

Izzie nodded satisfactorily. "I'll tell George," she said as if everything was set. Meredith cleared her throat.

"Izzie, I don't think..." she began, but trailed off when she once again noticed the looks between her two girlfriends. If she hadn't known better, she would call them conspiratorial. It was kind of unlikely though. Izzie and Cristina weren't talking a great lot when she wasn't around. And since she hadn't told Cristina anything of yesterday except for the little something just a few minutes ago, and considering that Izzie hadn't known she was going, they hadn't really had that much of an opportunity to exchange any details.

"Think of it as a way of avoiding McDreamy," Cristina suggested lightly and Meredith winced. Even though not having to deal with their fight seemed tempting, she knew that avoiding Derek even more was the last thing she should be doing. But studying was a reasonable excuse. One he couldn't coax her out of. If he now did bother to show. Deciding that anything was better than sitting in the house alone and wait for him only to realize he wouldn't come, and being too tired to argue anymore, she finally gave in.

"Okay." She tossed a glance behind her and caught sight of Derek taking the cafeteria floor in long strides. Not daring to look at any of the others, she rose from her chair after hastily deciding to abandon the last of her lettuce and pick up a Hershey's bar instead. "I really need to head back to the pit," she mumbled. "See you guys later."

Izzie's triumphant expression was replaced with a concerned one as she saw Meredith leave. "If you need a ride home, just page me, okay?" she called after her.

The only sign that Meredith had heard was a slightly raised hand waved in Izzie's direction before her messy ponytail vanished out of sight.

-----

Meredith nodded a silent thank you at the lab technician handing her the lab work she'd ordered earlier. She eyed them quickly. Everything seemed to be in order. Derek and Mark should be able to go on with the procedure without any delays. She stifled a yawn and wondered what she was supposed to do now. The surgery was not until 3 and Andrew didn't need to be prepped until the last half hour or so. The best thing she could do was reading up a little on the cranial vault reconstruction so she wouldn't be standing like an idiot in the O.R. Folding Andrew's lab scans, she headed towards the nurses' station to use the computer for her research. The activity around it had decreased a little, but there was still people surrounding it, throwing questions and demands at the nurses. A tall woman in a deep green woollen coat whose designer Meredith guessed Addison would be able to identify at once stood at the far side of the counter.

"Look, I'm supposed to pick up my daughter," she said sharply to a young nurse that seemed more than a little intimidated at the sight of her efficient manner. "I don't know which room she's in and I guess it's a lot to ask you to tell me that?"

Meredith slipped the labs into Andrew's chart and after putting it in its place again, she walked over to the woman. She had a suspicion just whose daughter was in question here.

"Excuse me," she said vacuously . "Are you looking for Julie Fowler?"

The woman turned around to face her, her eyes expectant. Meredith tried not to feel dwarfed when she towered over her in all her elegance. "Yes. Do you mean you actually can tell me where she is? In opposite to some people, I haven't got all day." She cast the nurse a meaning glance and Meredith gave her an apologetic grimace.

"Mrs. Fowler, I'm Dr. Grey. We spoke on the phone yesterday. If you come with me, I'll take you to see Julie. She's been waiting for you." Meredith saw something glimmer in the woman's eyes at the mention of the phone call, but she said nothing about it. "If you'll excuse me for a minute, I'll go get her discharge papers and she'll be good to go."

She leaned over the desk and asked the nervous nurse for the required paperwork. No one spoke until Meredith had the papers in her hand and they started walking towards Julie's room. Meredith waited for Mrs. Fowler to ask how Julie was doing, but seeing as nothing came, she cleared her throat.

"Julie's gonna be fine with a few days of rest. The fell was pretty scary for her and she has some minor injuries, but nothing that won't pass eventually." She hesitated. "She's gonna need to stay home from school for a couple of days and it would be good if she had someone with her then."

"Great -- as if I already didn't have my hands full with her," Mrs. Fowler said exasperatedly. Meredith's unease from talking to her over the phone and from the talk with Julie crept up her spine again. She noticed an empty wheelchair as they rounded the corner and remembering hospital policies, she took it with her as they went.

"She's a good kid," she said quietly. "She's smart. Maybe she needs a little attention, but she's a good kid, staying out of trouble." Suddenly she really wanted to convince Mrs. Fowler of this before they got into Julie's room. Mrs. Fowler's raised eyebrows did nothing to reassure her she was succeeding though.

"How do you know that?" she questioned. "She's definitely not staying out of trouble." She laughed harshly. "I am a single mom, I work my ass off to pay for everything. Do you think she's appreciating that? She's always asking for more than I can give her."

"Did you know she didn't want us to call you yesterday?" Meredith asked, trying to stay calm. "Suggesting that made her beside herself for having to interrupt you at work. That doesn't strike me as selfish." If anything, it struck her as an act not belonging in a happy, well-adjusted kid.

"That just means she was ashamed of having to once again admit her clumsiness. Seriously, could she have had worse timing than this? I'm in the middle of an important negotiation, which she very well knows."

Meredith tried to shut out the obvious parallels to her mother's attitude, she really did, but somehow she couldn't stop herself. "I just think she feels like nothing she does is worth your attention," she blurted. Mrs. Fowler's eyes were like ice when she looked at her.

"If you are trying to imply that this somehow would be on me..."

"She didn't do this to hurt you," Meredith said, trying to hide her impatience. "But you're her mother and Julie worships the ground you walk on. She's in desperate need of your unconditional attention." She wished she had a little more time, but they had reached Julie's room and without even so much as a glance at Meredith, Mrs. Fowler stepped inside. Meredith followed suit and caught the turmoil of emotions that flashed over Julie's face as she looked up and saw her mother.

"Hi, mom," she said, her voice a strange mix of shy and happy. She cast a glance at Meredith but turned directly to her mother again, as if to read something in her face. Meredith's heart almost broke at the sight of her uncertain smile.

"Are you ready?" Mrs. Fowler asked her daughter without offering a smile in return. "The sooner we can get out of here, the better." Julie's smile faltered but she nodded and she stood up a little clumsily while she tried to handle her arm's collar.

"I have your discharge papers, Julie," Meredith said. "I'm just gonna sign them and you'll be good to go." She smiled warmly at her patient and took a pen from her pocket and began signing off all the boxes labeled M.D. Nobody said anything and she felt the tension between mother and daughter.

"Mrs. Fowler, I'm sure you're wondering about Julie's injuries," she said in an attempt to break it as she helped Julie down in the wheelchair and started walking towards the elevators with her. She was careful to maintain a polite tone and carried on before Mrs. Fowler had time to actually answer. "She has a brain concussion, which we have kept an eye on overnight and which seems to be under control. She also has a broken collarbone, so we have given her a collar-n-cuff."

Mrs. Fowler merely nodded. "Is there anything particular she should think of?" she asked indifferently.

"Well, we'll schedule a check-up in a week," Meredith replied. "Until then, she shouldn't participate in gym class. She should stay home from school a couple of days to get some rest and let her head heal." Entering the elevator and pushing the ground floor button, she looked straight at Mrs Fowler. "As we spoke about before, we strongly recommend that someone stays with Julie when she's at home. The brain concussion shouldn't be a problem, but there are always risks with brain injuries that can't be predicted. A little dizziness, nausea and fatigue are common and any increase of these symptoms could indicate damage that we haven't seen. Therefore, it's important that Julie has someone to supervise her until we can write that off." Meredith tried to put emphasis on her words, but she waited in vain for Mrs. Fowler's reaction and walking out of the elevator, the moment was gone. As soon as the elevator doors closed behind them, a shrilling melody went off and Mrs. Fowler efficiently flipped her phone open and took some quick steps aside to talk undistractedly.

Meredith wheeled Julie to the exit and parked the chair. The girl squirmed uncomfortable where she sat and didn't dare to look at neither Meredith nor her mother. Meredith sensed her embarrassment and squatted down on the floor so that she came eye to eye with her.

"Julie," she said gently. "Listen to me, okay? You did really great yesterday when you came into the E.R, being here all by yourself." She paused and waited until Julie lift her head and met her gaze.

"You were good to talk to," she whispered. "It made it easier."

Meredith cast a glance at Mrs. Fowler who stood with her back at them and leaned against Julie somewhat conspiratorially. "I made my mother get me a cat." Julie looked bewildered at her and Meredith looked her straight in the face. "I knew she wouldn't agree to a dog. Too much responsibility. But she caved in to a cat. It was good company." She wanted to say more, but she knew it was time to let them go. She couldn't do anymore for Julie. She stood up and checked the chart to make sure she hadn't missed anything.

"Are you ready?" she heard Mrs. Fowler ask as she approached them, apparently eager to get going. Julie nodded and stood up from the wheelchair, her movements a little unsure and slow. Instead of walking over to the door, however, she turned to Meredith.

"Dr. Grey... can I give you a hug?" she asked shyly.

"Of course, sweetie," Meredith replied and hugged her, careful not to touch her injured arm. She felt a stream of hot breath and a quiet thank you against her ear as Julie's arm a little clumsily embraced her back, and for some reason she felt incredibly sad.

Julie loosened herself and walked over to her mother, who without so much as a glance backwards hurried through the doors. Julie turned, however, and Meredith did a little wave with her hand.

"Take care, Julie," she said, and Julie nodded a little before she turned and followed her mother. Meredith stood and watched them go, hating the feeling of helplessness that left her with.

-----

It didn't matter how hard she tried. Staring all she had at the papers she had printed, Meredith was still unable to focus on the text. She felt like everything she was doing -- moving, thinking, talking -- she was doing it in slow motion. Luckily, she was alone for the moment and didn't need to fake any kind of fineness. She shifted positions where she sat on the old gurney in the abandoned hallway and pulled up her knees to her chest. She really had to learn this. Maybe if she tried to break the surgery down in steps? Make a zigzag incision from ear to not to picture Julie's face, or Derek's face, or your mother's face. Place Leroy clips to curtail bleeding and peel back the scalp. Don't think of lonely late nights with loud music and a thousand watts worth of electricity. Drill the pilot holes into the skull and separate the skull into pieces. Put aside just which memories could be appropriate to tell Derek. Reshape the pieces and fit them back together with sutures and screws. Close out the voice of your mother. Use bone proteins to fill the gaps from the expanded skull. Don't recall Derek's accusations. Remove the scalp clips and close the incision.

"Everything okay?" Meredith, having abandoned the text once again and staring blankly out in the air, jumped at the sound of a voice near her ear. Alex flopped down next to her at the gurney and threw her a bag of chips, most likely from the machine down the hall. "So what are you doing down here?"

Meredith shrugged but started tearing at the edges and fishing up some. "Prepping for Sloan's surgery," she replied with a sigh. "You?"

Alex waved a little with the heavy book in his hand. "Had some time and really need to cover cardio."

Meredith merely nodded and stared at the papers in her lap again. Peel back the scalp...

"Hey." Alex's voice was uncharacteristically gentle. "Are you sure you're alright?" She sighed again. She was sick and tired of that question, even if she maybe invited to it a lot more than she was willing to admit. But she couldn't really just shrug it off and say she was fine. Not to Alex. She stared down at her shoes, pretending to count the ribs at the edges. "It's just that you seemed to feel a little strongly about your patient earlier," he continued.

She looked at him, surprised that he had picked up on that. "Um... you mean... " She tried to think of what words to use to describe Julie to him, but he was faster.

"The one with the mother. Yeah." He made an apologetic grimace. "Sorry. I just figured... you know, with what happened yesterday and all. It seemed that you related." Meredith looked down again, not sure of what to answer him. He was probably worried she was gonna go all Izzie and get too emotionally attached. And she knew she had been about to.

"I guess I sort of did," she admitted quietly. "And now..."

"Now you're hiding," Alex said, once again finishing her sentence for her.

"No," Meredith said, but she knew she didn't sound too convincing. "I needed to study. I've never even seen a reconstruction like this before."

"So what about the nice, cosy offices upstairs with computers and all research you could ask for?" Alex said and nudged her softly in her side, his eyes twinkling a little.

"It's quiet down here. No people."

"And no Shepherd?" Again, Meredith looked at him in surprise. Alex held up his hands. "Hey, I'm just drawing my own conclusions here. Abandoned hallway seems like a good place to not communicate." He reached over her and grabbed a fistful from the bag. His crunches were loud and broke the silence like Meredith didn't know how to.

"Well, Derek's not here," she nodded at last. "And that's... good." She hesitated, but Alex didn't say anything. "He's kinda mad at me."

"For not calling him yesterday?"

"No. Yes. Sort of." Meredith swallowed. "For... apparently, I'm not... letting him in."

"Well, do you?" Alex raised an eyebrow at her questioning look. "You said apparently. So is it according to him, or according to you?"

Meredith thought about this for a moment. She was astonished over how quickly Alex had gotten hold of the essentials in what she was trying to say, but she didn't know if she really had the answer. "It's... He let me understand that," she mumbled. "But it's true. I don't really... tell him things. And yesterday... " She broke off. "Now I'm doing it again," she said with a humorless little laugh. "Telling you. Telling my friends. Not him."

"Why?" The simple question made Meredith feel a little unsettled. There was no accusation in Alex's voice, no judgment or resentment. Just genuine curiosity. And what he was asking was justified. Meredith just didn't know how to explain it.

She looked defensively at Alex. "I've never done this before. You know. The relationship thing. Where you share. And it's just... What if he walks away?" There. She had said it. Aired her most secret fear that she just recently had admitted to herself, but that she knew always had been there, pocking and nagging on every little feeling she'd ever allowed herself to experience in this relationship. "I know I'm the one that walks away," she tried to joke. "I mean, look at my record. I even died on him. I..."

Alex held up his hands. "Whoa, wait. He's mad at you for that? For dying?" His voice was quiet, but had an dangerous edge to it, one that she guessed Derek wouldn't want to further acquaint himself with. She bit her lip.

"No," she said quickly. "But my point is, I'm the one with abandonment issues. Of course I think he'll leave me. Right? I mean... he did leave me for his wife. When we were great. And now... if I tell him..." She quieted, not sure of how to make sense of her incoherent speech. "Alex, yesterday was ugly," she said at last. "My childhood was ugly. My mother..." She looked at him. His eyes told her what she'd known already; she didn't have to say anything else. Unlike Derek, whose childhood memories surely consisted mostly of happy Christmas dinners and motherly concern and at the most one or another fight with his sisters, Alex knew. "He says all those things," she mumbled. "About forever and about sharing and about opening up. But if I actually do... he'll regret it. He doesn't wanna know."

Alex had watched her intently while she spoke. He dragged his hand through his short hair and seemed to contemplate what she'd said. "So you think he'll walk away if you tell him. That it'll be bad. That he can't take it." Meredith nodded for each statement, Alex's matter-of-fact tone making her feel a little less like a little child about to be patted on the head. "So, how bad are things now?" She blinked at the sudden turn from confirmation to the blunt interrogation. "When you don't tell him?"

"Um..." she stuttered. She felt almost too overwhelmed to think, but of course Alex had once again hit too close to home. "Not great," she admitted quietly. "I push him away. He can't take that. He and his savior complex. He said..." She swallowed. "He said he doesn't trust me. That he thinks I will walk away again. That I'm not in... this." She waved vaguely with her hands in an attempt to visualize whatever _this_ was meant to cover.

"Seems to me like you two have some talking to do," Alex stated dryly. "Seriously, Mer, I can't advice you here. It's not like I'm sharing stuff. But... I think you'll want him to know. You want this guy. And if telling him means he breaks up with you... well, it seems like not telling him will do the same. Maybe he can't share it with you. But if you don't tell him... he'll never get the chance to prove to you that he can handle it."

Meredith bit her lip. She hadn't really thought about it that way before. She fidgeted with her wristwatch in an attempt to make some use of her hands, that she suddenly didn't know where to put. Alex crumpled up the now empty bag of chips, took aim and threw a perfect shot into the bin a couple of yards away. He smiled triumphantly, but became solemn again almost at once.

"I'm not particularly fond of the guy," he said flatly. "Not after what he did to you. But he's not gonna walk away." Meredith looked at him in surprise. "There are two reasons," Alex went on. "One, and now I sound like a chick, he's all over you. A blind could see there's no one else for him. And two, he's not that kind of a guy. Now, I, I could leave. I leave when it's difficult. But Derek... he's an honorable man. He'll stick by." He shrugged.

Meredith closed her eyes. She wanted so to believe in Alex's words. She wanted to be sure. To know what was right. To know what was gonna happen if she told him. "I'm scared," she said in a little voice that brought back the feeling of being a child again, begging for comfort.

Alex touched her shoulder. "I know," he just said, and somehow, he didn't need to elaborate. He knew. She rested her head against his shoulder and they sat in silence for a couple of peaceful minutes. Meredith's exhaustion from before popped up its head again and she almost dozed off where she sat. When Alex carefully shifted positions, she stirred and sat up straight. Her mouth felt somewhat dry and she licked her lips and looked absently down on the research papers in her hands. Surgery. Crap. What time was it?

"Dammit, Alex," she hissed. "I was supposed to begin prepping my patient five minutes ago. I need to... " She stood up quickly and hurriedly shoved her papers into a messy heap. She took a few steps towards the stairs, then turned and looked at Alex.

"Thanks," she said earnestly. "For letting me talk."

"Hey," he answered. "Being scared means you have something to lose, right?"

-----

The snapping sound echoed in the O.R. Meredith saw that some of the younger nurses flinched at the sight of Mark's fingers forcing the baby's skull bone to bend, cracking the small bones inside of it. She didn't, however. Her exhaustion during the day was forgotten due to the intense surgery that had taken place before her eyes the last four hours.

"Why are we causing the patient these greenstick fractures, Grey?" Mark asked without looking up from what he was doing.

"It will help to stop the flow of the blood," Meredith said. "It helps the reconstruction process."

"You've done your homework," Mark observed. Meredith smiled under her surgical mask. She had been a little nervous to go in to the procedure, feeling unusually unprepared than what she knew she should be. But in some way or another, what she had read in the hallway before Alex's appearance had stuck to her brain and she had been able to follow the surgery without any trouble.

Mark folded the baby's scalp back onto the skull and studied his work carefully. "Take a look," he said. "Does he look symmetrical to you?"

Meredith looked intently at the baby's new face. It was round and flat in opposite to before, when the forehead had pointed outwards and the eyes had been too close together. Mark and Derek had reshaped the skull and remodeled the bones surrounding the orbit. There was an enormous difference and she could tell the satisfaction of everybody in the room as nobody broke the admiring silence to answer Mark's question. He however, frowned a little, going round the table to take a better look at the child's face from all possible angles.

"Here," he said, pointing to the child's left temple. "A little more BMP here." He peeled the yet loose skin flap back again and applied the protein used to hold together the skull fragments. "There." He looked up. "Will you close, Dr. Grey?"

Meredith smiled in surprise. Mark wasn't known for letting interns do anymore than the bare grunt work, if only that. But she was delighted at the opportunity no matter the reason and stepped forward, letting one of the scrub nurses take over the clamp that she'd been holding. Mark nodded at her and left the O.R., leaving Derek to supervise her.

Carefully, she started to remove the scalp clips that had been used to reduce any bleeding when opening the skull up. Her head whirled with all the question Mark or Derek had posed her during the procedure, and pride that she'd been able to answer them all. _Why do we use Leroy clips, Dr. Grey? Because cauterization won't leave a pretty scar when the wound heals. _She tossed the last of the clips onto the sterilization tray a nurse held in front of her and started suturing the zigzag incision Mark had made from ear to ear across the top of the little boy's head.

She glanced up at Derek who was standing at the other side of the table. He was supposed to be focusing on the monitors that kept track of Andrew's vitals, or perhaps on the trail she was creating with her tiny sutures. Instead she caught him scrutinizing her while she worked. Not her fingers, not her sutures, but her face. She blushed and hoped that it hadn't been visible under the surgical mask. She'd spent the greater part of the surgery considering what Alex had said while stealing hidden glances at Derek and covering behind the mask of a confident surgeon, it was surprisingly easy to convince herself of confidence also in her private life. Alex had been right. Not telling him would make him walk away sooner or later. And if there was a chance that telling him prevented that, she had to take it. Damn it, she was in this. It had to wait, though. A two minutes conversation in the hallway or the scrub room didn't seem the right place to spring her past on him. At the actual thought of her past, she shuddered and forced herself not to go further down memory lane.

"I'm done, Dr. Shepherd," she said after a couple of minutes just concentrating on the patient, and looked down at the closed wound trailing over Andrew's head. She had intentionally stressed his title to mark that she preferred being professional on hospital grounds. She was usually eager to maintain their working relationship without throwing their private one into the mix, but at some occasions that was harder than at others. Today, after the disastrous scene earlier where they certainly hadn't called each other doctors, it seemed important to keep the distance, and she knew more than actually saw that Derek let his gaze shift focus from her face to her work. She waited anxiously for his opinion. Had she been attentive enough?

"Excellent, Dr. Grey," he said calmly. "Good work, everyone," he directed at the nurses left in the O.R. "He's ready to be taken to the PICU." The nurses started to unhook Andrew from some of the monitors and remove the surgical drapes and Meredith and Derek slowly made their way out to the scrub room, throwing their gowns and gloves into the bin.

Derek didn't say anything as they carefully scrubbed their hands and that made Meredith unsure of what he was thinking. Was he still mad at her? Disappointed? She felt her confidence slip away from her together with the water that rinsed her hands and she bit her lip. She had to say something to him, or she would lose her courage.

"Derek?" she said hesitantly. "I... um, I think we need to talk." She chanced a quick glance at him and went on without waiting for an answer. "And I know that our last conversation didn't exactly work out and I... I'm sorry for... " She broke off, not really knowing what she was sorry for. Making you feel unwanted. Destroying you. Everything. "Anyway," she said nervously. "I... know I'm not big on the talking thing and that you probably hate me right now and that you..."

"Meredith," he said softly. "I don't hate you. I never could." He gave her a look so rich with feelings she couldn't begin to separate them from each other. "And I'm sorry too. I didn't want to make you upset earlier."

Meredith looked into his eyes, almost losing focus from trying not to give in for the urge to just lean into him and not have awkward talks. But she straightened up. "No," she said. "You don't get to be sorry. You were honest with me. And I think I could spend the rest of this night to keep coming up with synonyms to how sorry I am for causing you all that pain." She took a breath. "But I'm not going to, because we need to talk. And I need to be honest with you."

Derek seemed like he wanted to say something, but he merely nodded and she bit her lip. She knew what she wanted to say, but she wasn't sure of his reaction.

"It's just... You must believe me when I say I'm fine with what happened to me in the water. I really am, and you not believing me is disconcerting. I really try to enjoy my second chance here." She held up a hand when he tried to interrupt her. "Wait. I know it's easy for you to think otherwise, and I know that after last night, it must seem even more unlikely. But that wasn't about that."

She knew she had started out with the not so great part. The frown on his face confirmed that it had been the more accusing part than the sharing part, so she licked her lips, not really daring to look at him and hesitated, careful with what words she chose.

"Yesterday was rough, Derek. I got an unexpected wave of mommy memories splashed into my face, and it was... it was kind of bad. I'm not proud of how it made me feel. And me not wanting to talk about it, it's not you. It's my way of not letting them struck me twice in one night. I couldn't do it, Derek, and I might have been too tired to resist yesterday, had you really tried to make me." She quieted, not sure if she'd said too much or if it had been the right thing to tell him, and chewed on her lip until it must be white and almost rubbed raw.

Derek's face was attentive and his eyes were resting on her mouth, as if he hadn't heard her stop talking and was expecting more. "I'm sorry, Meredith," he said at last, clearing his throat. "I don't want to make things worse for you." He hesitated and Meredith could hear how he threaded carefully not to say the wrong thing. "Even though I wish you felt you could tell me everything, you don't have to. But telling me nothing sets my imagination, you know." He gave her a wry smile. "And not the lusty, horny one."

Meredith snorted. Derek smiled broader before continuing.

"You don't have to tell me. But it seems like memories that make you feel that bad maybe will hurt you less if you talked about them. I'm just saying maybe here, Mer," he added when he saw her expression. "It's up to you."

Meredith nodded slowly. She felt relieved. She had said something, and Derek hadn't paled with discomfort, or changed subjects. And he hadn't prodded either. Maybe what he said was true. She knew she should. To let him in.

"Maybe," she said after taking a deep breath. "Maybe, Derek. Maybe I feel brave enough to tell you. It's just... tonight, I really need to study for the intern exam. And Izzie insisted on transforming our study session to a slumber party. With food." She gave him a resigned look at the mere thought of such an idea and he grinned.

"Slumber parties make bad places for private talks," he agreed, looking both happy and a little disappointed at once. "We can talk later, okay? Aren't you off tomorrow? I have the morning free. How about I take you out for breakfast?"

Breakfast. That sounded safe. Like something a couple would do. A happy, steady, committed couple.

"Okay," she said, feeling suddenly lighthearted. She felt like she could have been standing just looking at him for God knows how long if she hadn't caught sight of the clock on the wall in the O.R. "Oh my God. I'm really late for the study... slumber whatever. Izzie's gonna kill me if I don't get going." She backed out of the scrub room, not taking her eyes from him until she had to turn around to walk out in the hallway.

"Meredith?" he called after her just as she was about to close the door. She turned and looked at him expectantly. He smiled reassuringly. "You did good today."


	5. Fools Like Me

_Um... okay, so apparently summer and free time does **not **mean you get more time to write, which I was expecting... Oh well. Here's the next chapter anyway. Only one more to go. I didn't plan this one from the beginning, but after the previous chapters I really wanted to have some fab five scenes, so I decided to actually write about the slumber party Izzie convinces the others to have earlier. I thought it would be a bit of a filler, but it turns out Meredith needed her friends to get some perspective on the whole telling Derek about her past thing. _

Read and enjoy and happy summer to you all!

-----

Meredith sighed and looked around her. Her kitchen desk was overloaded with pans, oven mitts and greaseproof paper. On the table stood a shocking number of small bowls, most of them yet empty but eagerly waiting for something to go into them. Izzie was on the other side of the kitchen, gesturing sweepingly while talking to George. The knife in her left hand made the conversation look mildly dangerous. Cristina sat at the table, looking exasperatedly at the various vegetables lying next to the cutting board.

"How am I supposed to do this?" she muttered and glared at the colorful peppers. "Who has salad on their pizzas anyway?"

Meredith saw Izzie cast them a sharp glance from the doorway.

"Get working," she called at them. "Those vegetables won't cut up themselves. Mer, you can start with the minced meat. It takes some time."

Meredith doubtfully eyed the package of meat, still wrapped in plastic. She hesitantly lifted it and held it at an arm's length.

"What am I supposed to do with it?" she whispered to Cristina.

Cristina shrugged. "Put it in a bowl. Everything else seems to go in one."

Meredith pondered for a moment in which cupboard Izzie or Derek might have hidden the bowls. She rummaged half-heartedly through the three ones over the oven before finding a large white one in the corner cupboard where they stored the pots.

"Why are the bowls with the pots?" she muttered. "No wonder I can't find anything in here with this logic." She sat down and lined up the bowl, the scissors and the package of meat before her like the kitchen table had become her own surgical tray. "Now what?" she asked Cristina.

"Just put it in there," she answered, frowning at the red pepper that stubbornly refused to not sprout seeds and strange green hard things wherever she tried to cut into it.

Meredith unwrapped the piece of minced meat and dropped it in the bowl. The meat bounced a little until it lay there like some kind of broken organ.

"Um... I should chop it a little, I guess?" Meredith said uncertainly. "I've never seen a pizza with a gigantic lump of meat."

She looked around for one of the wooden forks that she had seen Izzie use for baking a lot of times, but nowhere in the mess Izzie had managed to make of the kitchen table could she locate one. Having no desire to search the whole kitchen for it, she reached for a regular one instead and poked the meat for a couple of minutes until it had transformed into small shreds, looking suspiciously like a heap of lifeless worms. She glanced at Cristina for approval, but she was glaring madly at her second pepper so she found it better to be quiet.

She wondered why Izzie had said the meat needed some time. It had just taken minutes. Now, Meredith knew her kitchen abilities hadn't got the best reputation, but clearly Izzie had misjudged her this time. She decided to fill some of the other bowls too and scrutinized the ingredients on the table. There were still vegetables to cut up, but she decided to leave Cristina to that. Izzie had bought the feta cheese and the pineapples prepared, so all she had to do was placing them in the small bowls for a nicer presentation. She could do that.

"Mer, have you moved your booze since I lived here?" George asked as he strolled into the kitchen, two bottles of liquor in his hands. "I brought some, but apparently, Izzie doesn't think it's a good idea for us to drink tequila while we're studying."

"That sucks," Meredith replied, smiling as she turned the jar of feta into a yellow bowl. "I bet you'd be better at pronouncing brachioradialis or semimembranosus after some shots. I moved my stash to the basement. Second shelf to the right."

George nodded and turned on his heel, but caught sight of the meat in Meredith's large bowl. "What's that?"

"Yeah, I'm done with the meat," Meredith said. "It took not at all as long as Izzie seemed to believe," she added proudly.

George paused and looked down in the bowl. His face twitched a little, but he managed to keep his voice in control as he spoke.

"You're done?" he said neutrally. "You sure? I mean, weren't you planning on... um, frying it?"

"Frying?" Meredith echoed dumbly. "I thought it should go in the oven anyway."

George took one look at her other bowls, where bits of pineapple and feta swam around in juice and closed his eyes for a second before thrusting the bottles of booze in Meredith's hands.

"Why don't you put these with your stash, as you know where it is? I can... um, finish for you here."

Meredith frowned but when she heard Izzie approaching, she found it best to retreat. She shrugged at George and left him to deal with whatever tantrum Izzie would throw about the apparently unfinished meat.

When she returned to the kitchen a good fifteen minutes later, having taken her time in the basement and even sneaked up in her bedroom to look for her study notes, the smell of frying meat met her. Everybody had gathered around her kitchen table. Izzie and George were bent over a tin, preoccupied by spreading out pineapples and pepperoni. Alex was doing the same on another tin and Cristina was sitting beside him, looking impatient.

"Hey Mer," Izzie said as she looked up. "We've saved you a bit on each tin. Decorate them with whatever you want on your pizza."

"We're starting to get really hungry," Alex added. "You'd better get going."

Meredith cast a glance at Cristina and sat down beside her. She studied the small colored bowls before her. Many of them were half empty already. Without inspiration, she spread some minced meat and salami on Alex and Cristina's tin and ham, olives and pepperoni on Izzie and George's.

"They'll be ready in about fifteen minutes," Izzie said after putting the tins into the oven. "Let's just get started with the studying while we wait."

She strolled into the living room with Alex and George in tow. Cristina rose and attempted to follow them, but Meredith remained seated at the table. Cristina looked at her.

"You coming?"

"Would you tell Burke about your past?" Meredith blurted. She wasn't really sure of what answers she was after, but the urgent need of certainty made her desperate to talk to someone.

Cristina raised her eyebrows. Slowly, she sat down again and studied Meredith's face.

"What do you mean?" she said apprehensively.

"I don't mean things like being barfed at on your high school prom or graduating with a minor in French." Meredith picked up an olive and bit into it. "Would you tell him about your dad?"

Cristina stiffened and gave her a sharp glance. "What do you mean?" she said again.

"You told me you had a stepdad," Meredith shrugged. "Ever told Burke about that? Or what happened to your dad?" She saw in Cristina's face that it was best not to mention what Denny had told her in the creepily empty O.R. Cristina herself had never mentioned how her father died – not even the fact that he had, coming to think about it.

Cristina's eyes narrowed. "This is about Derek." She snatched the second olive from Meredith's hand and put it in her mouth.

"I scrubbed in with him today," Meredith admitted, avoiding her gaze. From the living room she could hear George rattle off the common causes of post-op fever.

"I thought you were avoiding him."

"Yeah," Meredith muttered. "I was."

"And you want to know if that's what you should be doing," Cristina stated.

Meredith squirmed uncomfortably. Cristina's voice was not what she would call supportive. Still, she gave her a tiny nod. She did want to know. Being unable to shut out the others quizzing from the other side of the wall, she heard triumph in Alex's voice as he pointed out to George that the fifth W indeed was wonder drugs.

"Well, he's a McBastard," Cristina said. "He let you down when he felt like it." She made a pause, but seeing Meredith's expression, she sighed before the silence became too awkward. "Would he go along with your bank robbery?"

Meredith looked confusedly at her.

"Bank robbery? Remember? Would he turn himself in?"

"Oh," Meredith said slowly as she remembered Cristina's weird, desperate reasoning that morning in her bed not that long ago. "But Derek's not a complicit participant in this. He's totally innocent."

"Okay," Cristina said. "But it wasn't your idea either. You're innocent too." She bent over the table, hesitating only briefly before quickly squeezing Meredith's hand. "He would turn himself in, Mer." She looked like she was about to say something more, but when the oven's alarm shrilled, she withdrew her hand as if she'd burnt herself. "Okay, that was me being supportive for at least a week. I don't even like the guy," she muttered as Izzie came rushing into the kitchen.

"The food's ready," she announced. "Usually, I wouldn't need to state that to people sitting one feet away from the oven, but since you haven't moved one inch, I guess it's not as unnecessarily as I thought." She grabbed the oven mitts from the sink and pulled out the tins.

"Sorry," Meredith mumbled. "Can we help?"

"Nah," Izzie shrugged and placed a stack of plates on the desk. "Just take a plate and scoop up your pizza." She stuck her head out the door and motioned for George and Alex to break off their bickering and come eat.

Meredith was still pondering Cristina's words and didn't pay much attention to the conversation around the table, but upon hearing Colin Marlow's name, she looked up.

"So..." Alex took a large bite from his salami loaded pizza and smirked at Cristina. "You and the cardio God..."

"Whatever," Cristina scoffed. "Mind your own business, Evil Spawn."

Izzie eagerly leaned forward. "Come on, give us something. You did Colin Marlow!"

"Yeah, like we'll be discussing my sex life during dinner," Cristina said dismissively. "But feel free to tell us about yours."

"I don't have any. That's why I have to live vicariously through yours."

"Okay," George cut into their seemingly dead end conversation. "Did anyone have interesting patients today?" He raised his eyebrows as they all looked strangely at him. "What?"

"Somebody's not getting any," Alex said and jerked his head gleefully.

"What?" George said again. "I'm just trying to make conversation. Me, I scrubbed in on a sagittal sinus bypass with Shepherd today. He was pretty upset having to slice open the chest of his old friend."

"His old friend?" Meredith said, surprised.

"Split the chest open? In brain surgery?" Izzie asked simultaneously.

"Yeah," George shrugged. "I think they used to work together in New York. She had a venus air embolism. He had to massage her heart and manually aspirate right in the middle of the surgery."

"Derek sliced open the chest of his old friend?" Meredith repeated. "That must have been..."

"Magical," Cristina chipped in, her eyes shining by the mere thought.

"It was pretty intense," George admitted. "Although Burke seemed to think it was a way of showing off for Marlow. Olivia heard them argue in the stairwell."

"Oh, he's jealous," Izzie said, her eyes almost as shining as Cristina's. "A lover's quarrel! It's been a while since the last one."

Meredith shot her a dark look, knowing all too well that she was the one Izzie had in mind and not liking it at all. Cristina didn't even condescend to give Izzie a glance and the conversation stand-stilled a little after that, the silence only punctured by small attempts from George's side to break it.

When the others moved out to the living room as soon as the last pizza had disappeared from the plates, Meredith lingered a bit. She wanted to contemplate Cristina's points in some peace and quiet. She could see how she reasoned, but she could not really convince herself of its truth. It was not that easy. She couldn't be innocent in this. Could she?

"Mer," Alex shouted, interrupting her barely minute-long peace and quiet. "Come on, take your place, we're starting now."

Meredith did her best to clear her head and hurried into the living room, _Schwartz's Principles of Surgery_ under her arm and a bottle of water in her hand. Alex was sitting next to Cristina on the couch, leaned over the book that lay open at the table. The page was full of illegible scribblings and a couple of drawings meant to illustrate some or another organ.

"Take your seat, Mer," Izzie urged her and shooed her to the only remaining chair at the shortside of the table. Meredith placed her bottle of water at the table, dropped the book on the floor behind her and sank down at the chair.

"Okay," she said. "I'm ready."

"What types of transplant rejections are there?" Alex asked, not even looking up from his book.

"Um... hyperacute, acute and chronic," Meredith listed, counting on her fingers. She smiled satisfactorily when Alex nodded. He didn't compliment her, though, but went on with his next question.

"What's Kallmann's syndrome?"

Meredith hesitated. She knew the answer to this question, she knew she had read about it recently. What was it again? "Okay, wait, I know this," she said to gain some time when she saw the others grow impatient. "Um..."

"Whatever, it's secondary hypothalamic hypogonadism," Cristina interrupted, not caring to wait any longer. "Move over!" She jumped up from the couch and Meredith reluctantly stepped over Izzie's strategically placed feet and traded places with her. She opened her book and skimmed through the pages to find a good question, but before she could come up with anyone, a polyphonic tune of California Dreamin' drilled.

"Fuck," Cristina swore and groped for her phone. Izzie hastily unfolded her legs and crawled up from the floor where she had comfortably lain until now.

"My turn!" she called before anyone else could. She had to push Cristina's shoulder a couple of times before she finally rose and retreated into the kitchen to talk to someone about flower arrangements, sending Izzie a death glare in the passing.

"What causes stricture from a radiation bowel injury?" George asked her. "It's not a vein," he added when all response he got was a blank stare.

"Obliterative endarteritis!" Izzie exclaimed. She looked happily at George and flashed him on of her Crest smiles. "We're unbeatable together."

"Dream team," George agreed.

"Okay, my turn," Alex said, ignoring him. "What've you got? Bring it on."

"What is Littre's hernia?" Izzie challenged him.

"Uh," Alex hesitated. "Littre's hernia is, uh... Meckel's diverticulum in the hernial sac."

"In men," Cristina interjected, appearing from the kitchen.

"In women too," Alex argued. "Right, Iz?"

Izzie flipped the pages in her book, searching for the answer. "Um... I'm not sure," she said. "I can't see it here."

"Alex's right," George said. "Anyone can have it, although it's more common in men."

Cristina stared at him. "How do you... wait, the cards. You're studying with them, aren't you? Did you at least bring them?" Seeing the others' confused looks, she swept impatiently with her hands. "Callie aced her test," she explained, without doubt expecting the very same thing happening to her in just a couple of weeks. "I thought the whole hospital knew about her flash cards."

Izzie's face fell a little at the mention of Callie's name. She started to say something, but George shrugged and threw a little blue box over the table to Cristina, who lit up as a child on Christmas Day and immediately threw herself upon them like a starving lion.

The others willingly participated in her quizzing, but after round three of answering questions from the admittedly brilliant cards, Izzie yawned.

"I'll make some snacks," she announced. "My brain is craving sugar to put up with all this thinking." She rose without waiting for an answer and disappeared out in the kitchen.

Cristina didn't seem to notice. She silently flipped flash card after flash card and murmured the answers to herself before looking at the backside. Meredith, who after all sitting arrangement changes now was sitting next to her at the couch, yawned as well and let her legs rest over the couch's edge.

"Ask me something," she urged. She had thought Cristina was too deep into her own little world, but she posed a question without skipping a beat.

"What is Cantlie's line?"

"It separates the surgical left and the right lobes of the liver," Meredith replied without further hesitation. She couldn't remember it from a book, but Bailey always kept her on her toes whenever she scrubbed in on her surgeries.

"Yeah," Cristina nodded. "Which..." She broke off when her cell phone melody started chirping again. "What the...." she muttered, fishing her phone out of her pocket with vehement motions. "Yeah?" she said into the phone. Listening to the person at the other side of the line, she made a grimace at Meredith, handed her the flash cards and walked out of the living room, impatiently humming to whoever she was listening to.

Alex stood up too. He stretched her legs and started walking towards the hall. "I need some air," he said over his shoulder.

Meredith looked across the room. George was sitting at the same chair as when she had first come into the room, a little behind all the others. She wondered if Izzie's attitude to Callie was hard on him. Did he feel out of their little group nowadays? She had never felt it that way because she was with Derek, even if she knew her friends didn't particularly like him. She didn't think Cristina had either.

"Can I ask you something?" she wondered.

"Sure," he said, straightening up in that manner he had almost whenever she asked him something, looking expectant but calm at the same time.

"Would there be something Callie could say that would make you leave?"

He frowned at her. "Why are you asking that?" He scrutinized her, but she just shrugged and waited. "She's rich," he said at last, his voice flat but Meredith could hear that it was forced. "Seriously rich."

"George, that's fantastic," Meredith said softly, not really grasping why he sounded so neutral about it.

"No, it's... it's not," he said exasperatedly. "She didn't tell me. And when she did... the 200 dollars I'd been paying her for the hotel turned out to be her tip for housekeeping! She'd let me think we shared the bill. That's not... that's not fantastic."

Meredith could almost have laughed at how George's manliness seemed threatened, but she did understand that he was upset over it. She would have had a problem with that kind of withholding too, and she certainly knew Derek would be completely upset if she'd done it to him. As open-minded as he was in many ways, he was kind of old-school in others, and living off his woman would never exist in his world.

"Didn't Callie have some kind of explanation?" she asked curiously.

"Yeah, she said her parents' money had destroyed every relationship she's ever had." George didn't look particularly compassionate about this. "Guess not telling can destroy one too," he added grimly.

"So you're thinking about leaving her?" Meredith held her breath. If George would leave for that, wouldn't Derek obviously leave when he heard about her crappy past and the fact that she hadn't told him before? They sat in silence for a little while before George looked up at her.

"No," he muttered. "She's my wife. It must take more than that. But I'm seriously gonna have a hard time trusting her for a while."

"So you're staying out of obligation?" Meredith wasn't sure it was a better option. She certainly didn't want Derek to hang around just because he thought he had to. Hell, he probably wouldn't dare to leave her for any reason at all, terrified that she would jump in the nearest bay as he seemed. And then he would be bitter.

George's headshake broke her thoughts. "It's in my vows. I must believe we can get over it, you know? And there _are_ worse things she could have done, I suppose." He sighed. "Why are you asking? What did Derek say?"

"Nothing," Meredith immediately defended him. "He did nothing. I'm just..." She sighed as well. "I'm just afraid he won't be able to take my past."

"Oh, he's ham," George said. "Don't worry about it."

"Did you just say ham?"

George waved with his left hand. "It was the husband of a patient I had once... he was all about ham and eggs. Going by him, in each situation you have to ask yourself whether you are the chicken or the pig."

"Chicken or pig?" Meredith repeated, feeling just as stupid as she probably looked right now.

George smiled. "Yeah, apparently if you have a plate of ham and eggs, the chicken is involved in the meal. But the pig... he's committed."

"The pig is committed," Meredith echoed faintly, wondering if George had lost it somewhere along the flash card parade.

"Yep," he concluded. "So it's really a question of whether you are involved or committed. And Derek is definitely the pig. He's as committed as he ever could be. Although you'd want to explain the whole reasoning behind it before you call him a pig. Callie got kind of mad at me before I did."

"Thanks," Meredith said dryly. "I can imagine. And I don't think I want to hear what that makes me in this equation." Before she could consider what George actually had tried to tell her, she heard Alex's voice from the hallway.

"Mer, there's someone at the door for you," he called.

She sighed and rose from the couch, dumping her textbook unceremoniously on the table. She took her water bottle with her to refill it in the kitchen, but was on the very fine edge of dropping it when she walked out in the hall. She hadn't even heard the doorbell and she wished she'd been smart enough to ask Alex who it was before coming out there.

"Oh," she said sheepishly, at a loss for any other words. "Um... I... we were just about going to bed, actually... " she stammered, hoping it would be a reasonable excuse, having no idea what time it was.

"We heard about your mother. I'm so sorry." Susan Grey wrinkled her forehead in a sympathetic grimace and took a step towards Meredith.

Meredith sighed inwardly. If they had come visited her at the hospital, she would at least have had a supply closet to dive into. It didn't seem like there would be any way out of this, besides making the visit shortlived. "Thank you," she said flatly.

"Is there going to be a funeral?" Susan asked. "Because we'd love to help..."

"Oh, thanks, but no... she wouldn't have wanted that. That was not who she was." She tried to find something to say that wasn't a subject quite as uncomfortable. "Um... I hope the baby's doing fine?"

"Oh, yes," Susan smiled. "She's perfect. I've never seen Molly happier." She put her arm at Meredith's. "We just came to see that you were okay. Your father is parking the car. He's been really worried about you."

"That's nice of you," Meredith said politely, returning a stiff smile. "But you didn't have to. I'm okay, just going on as usual."

"Please, Meredith," Susan sighed. "We just want to be there for you. Let us invite you to dinner."

Before Meredith could answer, Izzie popped into the hallway with a bright smile.

"Visitors," she exclaimed happily. "I've made coffee. Does anyone want a cup?"

"I'd very much like a cup," Susan smiled, before Meredith could shoot Izzie a murdering glance. "Thank you, dear," she added when Izzie bounced out with a steaming cup in her hand. In the very same moment, Thatcher Grey stumbled in on the threshold.

"The spot where I always stood when Ellis had parked in the driveway was actually not taken," he announced, first afterwards realizing the number of people beside his wife standing there. "Um... hello."

"Hi," Izzie said brightly. "Would you like a cup of coffee too?"

"He's okay," Susan said quickly. "He's had enough coffee for a lifetime, if not more, and at the very least for tonight. Why don't you take me out to see the kitchen?" she added to Izzie in a tone that probably was meant to sound carefree and spontaneous, but that didn't fool anyone. "Thatcher, honey, I've invited Meredith to dinner."

"And I'm afraid I have a lot going on for the moment," Meredith pointed out, but all to ears that already had vanished into the kitchen, except Thatcher's. "Um, I have this... it's an intern exam," she finished lamely, not really sure what you was supposed to say to your estranged father.

To her surprise, her father smiled tentatively at her. "Yes, I remember very well when your mother was studying for them," he said.

"You do?" Meredith said in surprise. She hadn't thought of it, but of course her mother would have taken the exam too. "I... I guess she aced it," she went on with a small smile, not entirely sure if she wanted to know the answer, but at the same time burning to hear it.

"Yeah," Thatcher confirmed. "She was confident she would, and so she did. Those nights she was at home the weeks before, she made me quiz her. Never wanted to take a break and do something else for a while. I fed and changed you between those study sessions."

Meredith knew she would have been about one year old when Ellis was finished with her first year of residency. Being a general surgeon, she would only have done five years before moving on to the fellowship in Boston. She felt an unexpected rush of sympathy for Thatcher. She could just imagine her dad, as she remembered him, putting up with Ellis's surely frantic behavior and caring for her at the same time.

"So... " she said. "Do you remember any of that stuff still?"

Thatcher laughed slightly. "Well, I did spend a significant amount of time reading through sections of all those text books. At least I know anything with the word cardio is impossible to pronounce and takes forever to memorize."

Meredith smiled. "That pretty much concludes it," she agreed.

They fell silent, but for the first time since Meredith had went looking for her father, she didn't feel that it was awkward. She had so much she wanted to know from him, but all those thoughts whirling around in her head at nights and at occasions she least of all needed them to somehow refused to appear now. Maybe it didn't matter. Maybe they had all the time in the world, starting with that dinner Susan was so keen on. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all.

"There actually was an unopened box of cards somewhere." The words slipped before she knew they even were on their way out. When she saw him frown in confusion, she wished she could just stuff them back in and she swallowed uncertainly. "The card," she said quickly. "I... uh, found the card when... in my... in Ellis's old boxes. I had to go there and pack them and... " She knew she was rambling and desperately tried to think of something nice to wrap up this conversation with that wouldn't make her come out like an incoherent stuttering fool.

"I'm sorry," Thatcher said, blinking bewilderedly. "I don't really get... what card are you talking about?"

Meredith's heart sank at his words. He hadn't sent her that card. She didn't know how it could have ended up in her mother's photo album – maybe Susan, maybe someone else entirely – but he hadn't been the one to send it. She felt a blushing red creeping up her face and she tried to find something to say to cover up for her embarrassing, blunt outburst.

"Nothing," she muttered and brushed off some invisible wrinkles from her shirt. "It was... just nothing."

"Your mother moved to Boston," Thatcher said cautiously, repeating the words he had thrown at her at his threshold that time she'd tracked him down. "And she told me not to... I mean, I wanted to... but she told me. Not to call or come around. I never sent you a card, Meredith. I'm sorry. I... I should have. I was a coward. You mother wouldn't let me know you... and now I don't know what to say to you, but I should have. I should know."

To her horror, Meredith felt a single tear finding its way down her cheek, and she furiously wiped it away before looking at her father again, putting on a fake polite smile.

"I'm fine. I must have been thinking of someone else in that card," she said flatly. "Don't worry about me."

Thatcher squirmed where he stood and cast an anxious eye at the kitchen door where Susan had disappeared.

"But... I do worry about you," he said. "I worry about all my daughters... Molly, and her baby... and... Lexie and her studies... that's not easy... but I do worry about you too. How you're getting on... I mean, that's not easy either, with your mom and all..."

Meredith nodded and let him finish his sentence, but she knew she already had started to distance herself. His words didn't matter to her as they probably should. She felt tempted to give him a sarcastic snarl, but took a deep breath and showed him a tight smile instead.

"I... I'm sorry, I... have to... I'll get Susan for you."

She turned around, unable to even bother coming up with a reasonable excuse and fled out in the living room. Cristina was once again sitting in the sofa, muttering answers to herself under her breath while flipping the flash cards so fast Meredith doubted she could even read what they said. Alex sat cross-legged at the other side of the table, an apple in his right hand and a worn notebook in front of him. He was the only of them that acknowledged Meredith.

"George and Izzie are in there with your fake mom." He nodded at the kitchen. "Either they wanna blow this test, or she's quizzing them. She looks like she could be convinced to do that." He raised his eyebrows when taking a closer look at her. "What's wrong with you?"

"Alex, I need an out," Meredith breathed. "I can't talk to him anymore. Get him out of here."

Alex eyed her for a moment and took a bite of his apple. She must have looked desperate enough, as he stood up with no further questions. He took a swig from the water bottle at the table and then cast a questioning look to the hallway. Meredith nodded silently.

She could not hear exactly what was said in the hallway, and she had absolutely no desire to. She didn't dare to sink down at the sofa so she just stood there, her fight or flight responses all alert. Cristina didn't even seem to notice she was in the room, and Meredith didn't bother to make her presence known. She could vaguely hear sounds from the kitchen, voices and clinking of coffee cups and occasionally a little laughter. That all quieted after about five minutes of biting her lower lip raw and she guessed that was when either Alex or Thatcher himself came to get Susan.

When she heard the front door slam, she could finally relax enough to find a spot next to Cristina on the couch, just waiting for the questions she knew would hail anytime. Soon enough, Izzie, George and Alex filed into the living room. Izzie carried a large cup of tea and looked pitifully at her as she stretched out on the floor. George stumbled when he sat down in his old chair, not really catching her eye and seeming pretty embarrassed about the whole thing. Alex didn't acknowledge what had just happened and just resumed studying the worn notebook that nobody had touched since he had left the room.

"Susan said hi," Izzie said after a few minutes of silence. "She hoped you would do good on the exam. She might call you in a few days." She paused. "She seems very nice," she added. "Motherly."

Meredith stood up. She felt like she was going to be sick. "I'm gonna go to bed."

"I thought we were all sleeping downstairs," Izzie immediately replied. "It's a sleepover after all."

"Let it go, Izzie," Alex warned. "Yang and O'Malley can sleep downstairs. I'm going up soon too."

Izzie looked like she was about to reply sharply, but following Alex's meaning glance at Meredith's pale appearance, she quieted.

"Well, okay," she gave in. "I guess the sleepover is... over. I'm coming with you upstairs, Mer." Not acknowledging Meredith's faint protests, she took the stairs two steps at a time, waiting at the landing until Meredith had climbed them as well.

Meredith wasn't sure what to do with Izzie there. She thought she wanted to be to herself, but then again, what she wanted had turned out to be not what was best for her all times. Izzie's presence wasn't actually disturbing at the moment. She decided to just don't take any notice of her until she had to. She searched for her sweatpants on the floor, but found them hanging neatly over the chair and remembered Derek's strange tidying frenzy from this morning. Without caring about toothbrushing or anything resembling cleaning, she changed into them and then crawled into her bed, leaving Derek's side of it still covered.

She had only been lying there for a couple of minutes, feeling Izzie's gaze at her still form even with her eyes closed, before she felt long legs stretching out beside her. They lay in silence for a while, and Meredith was lulled into the feeling from the night before when they had been sitting in the stairs, not needing to say anything. She was strangely comforted by having Izzie there next to her, and even though she hadn't exactly gone to bed in the belief that she would fall asleep, she felt herself on the verge of drowsing away.

"I didn't have a dad, either." Izzie's words broke off her almost slumber. They were soft, but there was something else to them as well, something harder. "I don't think I ever did, at least not for as long as I can remember. It was always just me and my mom." She paused a little. "I loved my mom, I did, but for each man that paraded through our trailer, I couldn't help but wonder if this was him; my father. If he would stay this time. But they never were. And they never did."

Meredith turned to look at Izzie. She had never before heard Izzie say anything at all about her father and she was surprised over what it brought up in herself.

"I dreamed of my father for years", she said slowly. "He always came to pick me up in my dreams. He always loved me unconditionally." She hesitated. "What would you do if he turned up tomorrow?"

"It's different, Mer," Izzie whispered. "My father left me, but he never had me. I may not know anything about him, but if he were anything like all my friends' absent fathers, he was a seventeen year old kid that had quit high school and smoked a lot of weed. One that eventually took his things and moved to any big city to get something more out of life. It doesn't make him less responsible, or me less angry, but... "

"It's not personal," Meredith finished. "Yeah." She thought about this for a little while. "Would you tell... I mean, when Denny lived... Or... I mean..." She quieted, not sure if dragging Denny into this would be a good thing, especially as it really didn't have anything to do with the point. Izzie seemed more composed nowadays, but Meredith guessed the wound really wasn't healed in any kind of sense. "I mean," she started over. "Would you... do you think there are secrets that are best hidden? Or should you really tell everything?"

Izzie was quiet for so long that Meredith started to believe she either hadn't heard the question, or had dozen off.

"I believe... that there are chapters of your history you really don't want to share," she said at last. "I don't know if it's the best thing do to, though."

Meredith felt uneven jerky movements and understood that Izzie was fidgeting with either her cover or her shirt. Meredith hadn't bothered to turn on the lights when she went into her room, and now that the light that had shone in on them from the hallway had gone out, she couldn't really see.

"I did things when I was sixteen that I don't particularly want people to know," Izzie whispered in the darkness. "But those things help me sometimes to understand why I feel as I do about things. Or they give me an understanding of what other people may go through."

Meredith couldn't help but wonder what kind of things Izzie could be talking about, but she knew better than to ask. Izzie had obviously worked hard on keeping this secret, and she didn't want to make her tell her out of some misplaced obligation and then regret it. She tried to think about what Izzie really had told her instead, but suddenly the sleep she never thought she would get tonight drew closer and closer again. Things that helped her understand her actions of today...

Izzie glanced over at her friend. The snorings had just begun, which meant Meredith had been asleep for a little while. She didn't know if she should feel offended for boring her out with her story, or successful for managing to help her friend get some sleep after her no doubtful rough night. She shifted the pillow under Meredith so she would rest comfortably, and gently pulled the covers up over her. She hesitated for a moment, then shrugged and pushed the bedspread over the edge onto the floor, crawled under the cover and curled up at the side of the bed Derek usually slept on. Meredith could use all the support she could get, even if she didn't even notice it.


End file.
